Subscription Concerts 2024-2025Program A
No. 2034 Subscription (Program A)

French composer Hector Berlioz (1803–1869) laid the groundwork for Romanticism in music. His Symphonie fantastique (Fantastical Symphony) (1830) was a pivotal transition from the Classical symphony to the Romantic symphonic poem, a programmatic genre that Franz Liszt (1811–1886) would soon invent. In this epochal work, Berlioz employed a recurrent melody (representing a leading character) that he called “idée fixe” (fixed idea) foretelling Richard Wagner (1813–1883)’s “leitmotiv.” Also, Symphonie fantastique showcases the excellent instrumentation of Berlioz who is the author of a historic orchestration treatise.
Those characteristics are fully revealed in Harold en Italie (Harold in Italy) as well. Penned in the summer of 1834, it is about journeys. Inspired freely by Byron’s narrative poem Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Berlioz here reminisces his own journey in Italy utilizing his above-mentioned idée fixe technique and ingenious scoring skill. The winner of the Prix de Rome 1830 (a prestigious scholarship), young Berlioz had stayed in Italy for fifteen months. Having hard feelings toward Rome, then his base, he often escaped to nearby areas such as the Abruzzo mountains located northeast of Rome.
According to Berlioz’s recollections, Harold en Italie was initially conceived in response to a request from Nicolò Paganini. Impressed by Symphonie fantastique, the Italian legendary violinist asked Berlioz to compose a concerto for the former to display his Stradivarius viola. However, Berlioz’s sketch for the project dissatisfied Paganini shortly due to the not so virtuosic solo viola part brimming with rests. The original plan ended in failure, yet Berlioz would finish the work as “Symphonie avec alto principal (Symphony with Principal Viola),” entitling the four movements as below.
The first movement Harold aux montagnes (Harold in the Mountains) “Scenes of Melancholy, Happiness and Joy” consists of a slow introduction and the faster sonata section. The solo viola is first heard over harp giving the theme of Harold, a melancholy dreamer (Berlioz’s words). This melody will recur on the viola as the idée fixe throughout the symphony, depicting Harold’s wandering in nature. After the prayerful slow movement Marche de pèlerins (March of the Pilgrims) “Procession of the Pilgrims Singing the Evening Hymn,” the scherzo movement Sérénade d’un montagnard des Abruzzes (Serenade of an Abruzzo Mountaineer) quotes music by the Pifferari who come down from mountains to Rome when Christmas approaches: these itinerant musicians left a deep impression on Berlioz. The finale Orgie de brigands (Orgy of the Brigands) “Reminiscences of the Preceding Scenes” has brigands kill Harold, before the theme of brigands goes on the rampage at the conclusion.

[Kumiko Nishi]

Sergei Prokofiev (1891–1953) was born in Imperial Russia (today in Donetsk Oblast, Ukraine) in the last decade of the 19th century. Following the 1917 Revolution, he left his home in 1918 by permission of the Soviet authorities to compose and perform abroad. In 1936, he returned for good to the Stalinist USSR offering to him some carrots of fame and opportunities. The modernist composer since led a difficult life and was forced to meet the official Soviet style called “Socialist Realism,” otherwise he would be destined for purge, labor camp, torture or execution.
The background story of Symphony No. 4 reflects these changes his life went through. This work is based on musical materials from Le Fils prodigue (The Prodigal Son) Op. 46, the ballet score Prokofiev wrote abroad in 1928–29 for Sergei Diaghilev’s dance company, Ballets Russes. The ballet’s Biblical story features the titular protagonist who leaves his wealthy father’s house for a prodigal journey. The Son, penitent, returns home at the end.
Foreseeing the potential of the ballet’s materials for symphonic expansion, Prokofiev employed them to write the Symphony No. 4 Op. 47 which was first performed in 1930 in Boston, USA. The symphony’s 1947 version performed today could be considered a re-creation rather than a revised music: in fact, Prokofiev gave it the new opus number 112. This new version dates from the period after the communist party increased their censorship under the infamous Zhdanov Doctrine (1946–). Thickening the orchestra with piano, harp and other instruments, Prokofiev turned the compact neo-Classical symphony into the heavier, more extensive and heroic one. Despite all these efforts to radically change the work however, the Stalinist regime banned Op. 112 in the USSR during Prokofiev’s lifetime.
The opening movement has a slow introduction and the main sonata section. The march-like aggressive first sonata theme is from the number The (Male) Dancers of the above-mentioned ballet Le Fils prodigue. The melodious second movement spotting flutes is derived from the ballet’s expressive finale The Return where the Prodigal Son is welcomed back by his father with love and forgiveness. The third movement, slightly satiric, is a scherzo mainly based on the ballet’s number The Seductress. The final movement in a flexible rondo form begins with a resolute theme from the ballet’s opening The Departure and reaches the brassy, triumphant finish in the Soviet style.

[Kumiko Nishi]