Italian philosopher Umberto Eco is recorded as saying “I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth”.

Listeners to Shostakovich are often on the look-out for hidden messages in his music: some sign of political dissent, or a parody of the Georgian dictator encrypted in special note combinations or musical phrases.

Shostakovich was always quiet about what his music "meant." If there’s a story or meaning behind the First Cello Concerto, Shostakovich never wrote one down. He’s certainly not around anymore to tell it.

Ultimately, you need to be careful you don’t get distracted from the music, which is so powerful it doesn’t really need a story behind it. It stands up perfectly well on its own.

Similarly, Eduard Elgar’s “Enigma Variations”.  Although descriptive of fourteen people in Elgar’s life, it has bemused and challenged musical scholars, both professional and amateur, for decades as they try to unlock the secret enigma contained in his work, but so far, no convincing solution has been found.

Clearly, the best approach to both is just enjoy them for their wonderful music. You can check out both pieces of music and read notes about each by clicking on the links below, as well as the other shorter works that occupied our attention during the month: works by Smetana, de Falla, Schubert, Mozart, Beethoven and Haydn, which contain no enigma at all.
 
Session Notes 11th October
Schumann - Overture to Hermann and Dorothea
Shostakovich - Romance from "The Gadly"
Shostakovich - Cello Concerto No.1
Haydn - Symphony No.104 
 
Session Notes 25th October
Rossini - Overture to William Tell
Elgar - Enigma Variations
de Falla - Ritual Fire Dance
Beethoven -  Piano Sonata No. 17


Bill Squire.

When is a symphony not a symphony? When it’s an overture! Maksym Berezovsky (the Ukrainian Mozart) composed a Symphony in C lasting all of nine minutes, which also doubled as the overture to his one and only opera “Il Demonfonte”, and also as the ‘overture’ to our first session for April. 

Friedrich Nietzsche, a highly poetic philosopher was all the rage in Germany when Richard Strauss was a young man. Strauss set to music a wildly rhapsodic book of his called Thus Spake Zarathustra, which was the major focus for our group this session. The work isn't really about Zarathustra at all. Nietzsche simply used Zarathustra as a spokesman, a sort of prophet—hero, into whose mouth he put his own philosophy. Strauss’ "Zarathustra" is a music picture of man's greatest problem—his mortality, the grim fact that he must die. This painful problem is shown in terms of a conflict—the struggle between Man's tremendous need for immortality, and his equally strong need to accept the fact that he is mortal. It's a struggle we all share.

A little bit of Russian fairytale by way of contrast - Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite - completed the morning. As an encore the Pas de Deux from the Firebird ballet was danced courtesy of the Mariinsky Ballet Company.

The ‘Overture to get session two underway came from the pen of Robert Schumann in the form of his “Overture, Scherzo and Finale”. Written in the wake of his marriage to Clara Wieck (after a long and tortuous courtship made difficult by Clara’s father), it is essentially a symphony without a slow movement.  Schumann initially named it “Symphony No.2” before settling for the title “Sinfonietta”. 

When war broke out in August 1914, Edward Elgar was not among the enthusiastic.  He had serious forebodings, and after the cataclysm that effectively eliminated an entire generation of English youth, he plunged into despair.  His Cello Concerto (the major work for this session) is completely the reflection of a heartfelt response to the national tragedy.  It’s an unconventional concerto, but it is a masterpiece.  It is not only a reflection of the forever altered world of Britain in 1919, but also the deep and apt expression of great composer facing his own old age, and for that matter, an audience that soon saw him as an anachronism. 

When Rachmaninoff, wizard of the piano, meets Paganini, wizard of the violin, the result is the notoriously difficult Rhapsody — 24 variations on the 24th of Paganini’s Caprices — encompassing everything from knuckle-busting runs to the terrifying Day of Wrath medieval chant and the swoon-worthy 18th variation. Said to be Rachmaninoff’s finest work for piano and orchestra, it brought down the curtain on our April music excursions. Full notes and links to the recordings used can be found on Music Appreciation page of our U3A website.

​Bill Squire

​14th April
 
Session Notes for 14th April
 
Berezovsky - Symphony in C
 
R Strauss - Thus Spoke Zarathustra
 
Stravinsky - Firebird Suite
 
Stravinsky - Firebird Pas de Deux
 
28th April

Session Note for 28th April
 
Schumann - Overture, Scherzo & Finale
 
Elgar - Cello Concerto
 
Rachmaninoff - Rhapsody on a theme of Paganini
 
Start times - Rachmaninoff Variations

Our following of the planned MSO concert schedule for July kicked off with a couple of pleasant surprises in Dvorak’s “legends” – 10 piano pieces for four hands and a Beethoven concert aria “Ah Perfido”! To balance out these little known works, a scintillating rendition of an old favourite in Brahms’ Violin Concerto, and maybe “the greatest graduation piece of all time”, in Shostakovich’s First Symphony, rounded out the first session for this month.

“An Anthem for our Time” and “A message of consolation and hope in times of tragedy” is how Brahms’ “Ein Deutsches Requiem” has been described. This was the feature work of the second of our programmes for this month. In a sense then, an appropriate work to listen to and think about as so much of our world is engulfed currently with tragedy and grief on a huge scale. In keeping with that sentiment, Mussorgsky’s “Pictures at an Exhibition” bookends our programme – a memorial to a departed friend. In between there was Elgar’s lengthy Violin Concerto - a work steeped in mystery – and a little-known (or not so often played) Beethoven Overture.

Here are the links to the programme notes, which include  the YouTube links to the music performances:
​
10th July  Beethoven 2020; Anton Dvorak: Johannes Brahms: Dmitri Shostakovich
24th July: Beethoven 2020; Johannes Brahms, Edward Elgar; Modest Mussorgsky

​Interested in joining in the Beethoven Celebrations!  Enjoy the video links from the Beethoven catalogue suggested in the notes.

​
Bill Squire
​27 July 2020
​