Pictures at an Exhibition
Friday November 21, 2008 8:00PM
Saturday November 22, 2008 8:00PM
Description:
One of Northwest Ohio’s most-renowned composers sheds light on a program that explores the symbiotic relationship between the keyboard and the orchestra.
Samuel Adler was the longtime chair of the composition department at the Eastman School of Music, and is currently on the composition faculty member at the Juilliard School. A resident of Bowling Green, Ohio, Adler’s international reputation is attested to by awards from Chile, Wales, Israel, and Germany, among many others. A member of the American Society of Arts and Letters, Adler was recently awarded the Aaron Copland Award by ASCAP for life-time achievement in Composition and Teaching. The solo part for this piece for solo organ and orchestra, Lux perpetua, will be performed by S. Wayne Foster, who premiered the work in 1997 with the Dallas Symphony.
The composer Sergei Rachmaninoff was also regarded as one of the pre-eminent pianists of the twentieth century. His Second Piano Concerto has long been a staple of the concert stage, and within the last twenty years, the Third has become equally popular, in part due to its incredibly brilliant coda. This concerto has been a favorite among Toledo audiences due to its blend of virtuoso brilliance and Rachmanoff’s seemingly inexhaustible capacity for inventing melodies that remain in the ear long after one has left the concert hall. Pianist Kirill Gerstein makes his Toledo Symphony debut with these performances.
Modest Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition enjoys two lives - as a favorite display piece for virtuoso pianists, and as an irresistible temptation to orchestrators. The Russian pianist and conductor Vladimir Ashkenazy arranged the work in 1982; his version is preferred by Principal Conductor Stefan Sanderling, who will lead the TSO in one of the most popular Romantic pieces in the orchestral repertoire.
Points of interest:
· Mussorgsky wrote his Pictures at an Exhibition in memory of the architect, Victor Hartmann, a compatriot whose devotion to incorporating essentially Russian elements in his art found a kindred spirit in the composer. The Pictures of the title refer to Hartmann’s sketches, many of which have a significant element of the fantastic. Within these, Mussorgsky weaves the Promenade theme, representing, in his own words, “[his] own physiognomy…roving through the exhibition, now leisurely, now briskly, …and at times sadly, thinking of his departed friend.”
· Kirill Gerstein’s Rachmaninoff interpretations have been somewhat of a calling card for memorable debuts with orchestras. His Cleveland Orchestra debut featured the Rachmaninoff Third Concerto this past July, and he joined the young Venezuelan conductor, Gustavo Dudamel, in a joint debut with the San Francisco Symphony in March. Though his debuts with American orchestras have often been with the Russian masters, his original contact with the United States was through his parent’s numerous jazz recordings. Indeed, it was his original precocity as a jazz pianist that led to his being offered a full scholarship at the Berklee College of Music in Boston…at the age of 14.
Performances made possible by Rita Barbour Kern
Program:
Adler Lux perpetua* 15'
Mussorgsky arr. Ashkenazy Pictures at an Exhibition 36'
INTERMISSION
Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor 40'
*TSO Premiere
WGTE - FM 91 broadcasts the Toledo Symphony on FM 91 In Concert. Tonight's concert will be re-broadcast Thursday, April 30, 2009 at 8PM through the generosity of the Edward H. Schmidt Musical Arts Fund.
Radio Clips:
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