French composer Jacques Ibert was one of the early 20th Century composers to rediscover the wind quintet as a form, though he composed only one. In the wake of a turbulent new millennium and World War I which thrust the Western world into a new modernity, composers began balking at the excesses of the Romantic Era of music. No longer did gargantuan orchestras and extremely long, pathos-driven music seem appropriate for composer or audience. So some looked backwards and Neo-Classicism was born. This was a return to simplicity, clean lines and structural forms, wrapped in 20th Century harmony. Ibert, one of “Les Six” of French composers looking for new musical expression, was for a time at the forefront of Neo-Classicism. In 1930 he turned to the Classical promise of the wind quintet, and from that was born one of his most cherished chamber works: Trois Pièces Brèves.
Ibert’s charming Quintet shows him at his colorful and inventive best. Ibert fashioned it so that its movements could be played in any order or independently, without any compromise to the work as a whole. He found the five-wind ensemble to be an opportunity to show boundless colors in simple combinations. He also delighted in writing works as sheer entertainment, which Trois Pièces Brèves provides brilliantly. The rather puffed-up, and lovely, introductory fanfare of the first movement becomes gently sarcastic when it devolves into a bird-call passage. More wittiness follows when the sprightly march-like theme evolves into a waltz. The march and waltz then battle for supremacy, and Ibert chooses the dance. The second movement is a surprise in color and beauty from only two instruments, the flute and clarinet, ending by adding a few more instruments to prepare for the jocular third movement. In the finale, Ibert again flexes his talent for sonority – all five instruments here combine for some wonderful colors and a whirlwind of whim and fun. A slightly drunken jig-like theme is punctuated with vocalistic roulades (a flurry of quick notes just before the next note in a melody), and hints of good old-fashioned 1930’s dance hall music. Trois Pièces Brèves is a delicious wonder.
Milonga Sin Palabras
Ástor Pantaleón Piazzolla
(Born in Mar del Plata, Argentina in 1921; died in Buenos Aires in 1992)
From the time Argentinian-born Ástor Piazzolla was given the large keyboard accordion known as a bandoneón at around the age of eight until his death, Piazzolla was irretrievably drawn into the world of the tango. He became famous for his “Nuevo tango” in the 1960’s, a reinvigoration of Argentina’s “national” music that he derived from his formula of “tango + tragedy + comedy + whorehouse.” Though Piazzolla’s large output of music rests mainly on tango music with its distinctive dance rhythms, he was indeed a musical polyglot. Bach, Stravinsky, Hindemith, klezmer, jazz, popular music and a keen interest in traditional folk music all figure into his works, and so it was that he turned to his hometown of Mar del Plata to investigate its famous folksong and dance, the milonga.
The milonga had become popular in the 1870’s, growing out of a wonderful folk tradition called payada de contrapunto, a several hour to several day competition between two payadors (singers), who exchanged dueling verse to each other’s questions of life and love, usually ending with insults. Dance began to accompany the song form as it morphed into the milonga, and the combination of dance and milonga became regarded as an “excited habanera.” Piazzolla originally composed his Milonga Sin Palabras (“milonga without words”) for his wife in 1979 for bandoneón and piano. It soon became immensely popular and it was arranged for wind quintet by William Scribner. In Milonga Sin Palabras, Piazzolla again treats an old form through the filters of newer popular music. His Milonga wafts pensively but casually, with the rhythms and flickers of dance infusing it, yet its gentle lyricism adding depth and soul and timelessness. Beautifully crafted, Piazzolla’s Milonga seems to be returning to this old form, heard through the ears of ghosts who, while nostalgically remembering the old vocal competitions, infuse it with both new harmonies and melancholy.
Quintet in B-flat, Op. 56
Franz Ignaz Danzi
(Born in Schwetzingen, Germany in 1763; died in Karlsruhe, Germany in 1826)
Quintet in B-flat Major, Op. 56, No. 1
1. Allegro
2. Andante con motoa
3. Menuett – Trio
4. Allegro
After Giuseppi Cambini “invented” the wind quintet ensemble in the early 1800’s, two composers in particular took a keen interest and were influential in establishing the genre in the concert hall. First was Czech composer Anton Reicha (1770 – 1836) who composed 24 Quintets not long after Cambini’s, followed by German composer Franz Danzi and his 9 Quintets that were written most likely in the period 1820-24. These 33 works have become the foundation of the repertoire. Danzi was a highly respected cellist, composer and teacher in a long career that was witness to Mozart’s last years and Beethoven’s entire career, as well as being a mentor to Carl Maria von Weber. As a composer in his own right, he contributed to nearly every genre of the day and often with impressive works. Most impressive and most memorable are his Quintets, and his first three published as Opus 56 have remained deservedly popular.
The Wind Quintet No. 1 (of Op. 56) is an impressive and sparkling little masterwork in its genre, imbued with that wonderful late Classical spirit, light and airy, masterfully balanced and full of energy. The harmonies are clearly looking forward to the Romantic era, and the themes, breezy as they appear, are rich and often hint at something much deeper than just light entertainment. The second movement is quite the gem, featuring the double reeds (first oboe, then bassoon), in a rather wistful funeral cortege that is filled with ambiguity and bittersweet sentiment. Then the double reeds hands the baton to the flute and clarinet, creating a wonderful changing of light and color in the ensemble. Likewise, the Trio (middle) section of the third movement presents a masterful sequence as the theme is exchanged between each member of the quintet. The entire work is ripe with these ingenious techniques, and as charmingly as they fall upon our ears, the work is equally heady. Most impressive still is how Danzi, the cellist, captured the capabilities of each wind instrument with remarkable idiomatic wisdom.
Quintet in C, Op. 79
August Friedrich Klughardt
(Born in Köthen, Germany in 1847; died in Rosslau, Germany in 1902)
Wind Quintet in C-Major, Op. 79
1. Allegro non troppo
2. Allegro vivace
3. Andante grazioso
4. Adagio – Allegro molto vivace
Despite Danzi’s contributions to the quintet repertoire, the string quartet still held considerable cache with composers. But at the turning of the 20th Century, two important musical forces were underway. First was the war that raged over the future of music – the “New German School” of music (the tone poems of Liszt and the operas of Wagner) vying with the “Conservative” composers (the symphonies of Brahms and Schumann). The second transformation was at once mechanical and musical. Technological advancements to wind instruments were making them more agile, with wider ranges, transforming the music they could play.
Into this mix came August Klughardt who, in his youth, adored Liszt. But late in his life he began to appreciate deeply the Conservative path. The result was something magical producing a wonderful combination of both ideologies. With the richness and nimbleness now available in wind instruments and his growing fondness for conservative musical structures, Klughardt wrote his Wind Quintet between 1898-1901. It has become one of the cornerstones of the repertoire for both its Classical clarity and its deeply Romantic underpinnings.
Perhaps as no other composer, Klughardt understood the possibilities of this particular set of instruments and how “orchestral” they could sound, and how they could also bridge the gap between the two “Schools.” The first movement delves into lush melodies over rich and complex harmonies – a nod to his New German School forebears. The second movement, simple and bucolic, acknowledges Conservative aesthetics. The third movement is a magical mix of both Schools, where instrument pairings and inventive timbres create a folktale-like atmosphere – the music is never heavy and yet manages to be richly sonorous. The finale nods to the early Baroque with a somber and beautiful slow introduction, but what follows is an exploitation of just what these five wind instruments can do when set loose, virtuosic and breathtaking to the end.
Highlights from Porgy and Bess
George Gershwin
(Born in Brooklyn, NY in 1898; died in Hollywood, CA in 1937)
Selections from Porgy and Bess for Woodwind Quintet
1. Overture: Catfish Row
2. Summertime
3. A Woman is a Sometimes Thing
4. My Man’s Gone Now
5. I Got Plenty O’ Nuthin’
6. It Ain’t Necessarily So
7. There’s a Boat Dat’s Leabin’ Soon for New York
8. Oh, Lawd, I’m On My Way
Just on the heels of his extraordinary success with Rhapsody in Blue in 1924, Gershwin launched a new musical, Oh, Kay!, in 1926. In the throes of its rehearsals, Gershwin found he couldn’t sleep one night, and he picked up the new and hugely popular novel, Porgy (1924), by American author DuBose Heyward (1885-1940). The composer was enthralled with Heyward’s story about the Gullah-speaking African-Americans living in Charleston hoping to find fishing work on “Catfish Row.” Heyward’s main character, Porgy, was based on a real character he knew named “Goat Sammy,” a crippled man who got his way through town riding a cart pulled by a goat. The novel had all the elements for great theatre: crime, love, the little guy rising up to win the day, and so Gershwin immediately wrote Heyward asking to turn Porgy into an opera he hoped to call Porgy and Bess.
Since his teenage years, Gershwin had been enamored with the idea of writing an opera as the best way to get “popular” music into the Classical world. For various reasons, it would take him another nine years after reading Porgy to complete Porgy and Bess and to premiere it in 1935 in Boston. Historically speaking, it was a triumph of firsts, using an all African-American cast and bringing such a racially-charged piece onto the stage, but it didn’t win over the critics initially. Today, however, the opera Porgy and Bess is recognized as an American masterpiece, and its wonderfully singable songs and arias have been extremely popular in their own right. There is probably no other aria in the American song book as beloved as “Summertime,” and the opera’s almost embarrassing wealth of great music virtually begs to be played in any combination possible. Tonight’s arrangement for woodwind quintet is yet another example of the timeless appeal of Gershwin’s music.
https://www.friendswv.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/FOM_logo_340x156-300x138.jpg00Jen Rolstonhttps://www.friendswv.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/FOM_logo_340x156-300x138.jpgJen Rolston2016-04-13 17:54:292016-07-13 11:22:33Infinite Wind: April 9, 2016
Aaron Copland (Born in Brooklyn, New York in 1900; died in North Tarrytown, New York in 1990)
Appalachian Spring (original version for Chamber Orchestra)
For many, Appalachian Spring has come to represent the “sound of Appalachia” – that ancient chain of low mountains marching up the eastern seaboard, with their dense wilderness, granting views that gently span the horizon through a myriad of brilliant autumnal colors and misty pastels and filled with the folk music of song and fiddles seeming to be as ancient as the mountains themselves. The underlying story of Copland’s ballet is also equally well known: that of a newlywed pioneer family “building a house with joy and love and prayer.” Interestingly, neither the Appalachia theme nor this ballet story appeared in this piece until much later in its creation. Commissioned of Copland in 1942 by the famous American dancer and choreographer, Martha Graham, the grande dame of Modern Dance, together with the Coolidge Foundation, the ballet music that Copland originally conceived of was first titled “Ballet for Martha” and he said that “the music … takes as a point of departure the personality of Martha Graham.” It was only just before the ballet’s premiere in 1944 when Graham herself happened across the lovely phrase that became its title, “Appalachian spring,” finding it in a poem by Hart Crane called The Dance, (from the larger collection titled The Bridge) where the “spring” referred to a water source, not the season. Although a basic outline of the ballet’s story existed from the start, most of the details that we know today were hammered out in the several months prior to its premiere.
Two aspects in the commissioning of Appalachian Spring, however, were essential to its creation from the very beginning: the music had be danceable, and it must be “American” sounding. And these two aspects Copland undeniably achieved in this, his greatest masterpiece. American born and bred, Appalachian Spring has remained peerless as the music that captures the spirit of America. To be sure, its musical canvas conveys a humility and newness that has become easily attached to a nostalgic American perception of itself, and one of its most beloved melodies, the beautiful hymn tune “Simple Gifts*,” gives the musical score a deeply honest and hopeful feel. These characteristics lend themselves wonderfully to any dance interpretation. Originally scored for 13 instruments (1 flute, 1 clarinet, 1 bassoon, piano and strings) to be danced in the small Coolidge Auditorium in the Library of Congress, Washington, DC, Copland revised and condensed the score in 1945 into a suite for full orchestra, now its most well known version. The original version, however, retains its own wonderful charm and is a delight to listen to, especially when accompanied by dance.
The underlying story, according to the original published score, is as follows:
“…a pioneer celebration in spring around a newly-built farmhouse in the Pennsylvania hills in the early part of the last century [1800’s]. The bride-to-be and the young farmer-husband enact the emotions, joyful and apprehensive, their domestic partnership invites. An older neighbor suggests now and then the rocky confidence of experience. A revivalist and his followers remind the new householders of the strange and terrible aspects of human fate. At the end the couple is left quiet and strong in their new house.”
*A note about the tune “Simple Gifts”: The Shakers, a break-off sect from the Quakers, emigrated from England to America in 1774. “Shakers” was a pejorative term for the sect describing their lively and ecstatic form of worship, which involved a lot of their own, original music accompanied by swaying and twirling dance. Music played a part in all aspects of Shaker life, and was thought of, dually, as utilitarian and spiritual in essence, and these songs were referred to as work-song-hymns. In 1875, Shaker member Elder Joseph Brackett composed “Simple Gifts.” It was published in a compendium not long afterwards called The Gift to Be Simple: Shaker Rituals and Songs, which is where Copland found it. The song’s lilting, sweet melody and its humble, yet joyful, lyrics seem to capture the essence of Appalachian Spring as well as any description. They are:
‘Tis the gift to be simple, ‘tis the gift to be free;
‘Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be;
And when we find ourselves in the place just right,
‘Twill be in the valley of love and delight.
When true simplicity is gain’d,
To bow and to bend we sha’n’t be asham’d
To turn, turn will be our delight,
‘Til by turning, turning we come round right.
Antonio Vivaldi
(Born in Venice, Italy in 1678; died in Vienna, Austria in 1741)
The Four Seasons, Four Concertos for Violin, Op. 8, Nos. 1-4 I. “Spring” Concerto in E-major
1. Allegro
2. Largo e pianissimo sempre
3. Allegro
II. “Summer” Concerto in G-minor
1. Allegro non molto
2. Adagio
3. Presto
III. “Autumn” Concerto in F-major
1. Allegro
2. Adagio molto
3. Allegro
IV. “Winter” Concerto in F-minor
1. Allegro non molto
2. Largo
3. Allegro
In Venice, just down the quayside from St. Mark’s Square, stands a building called Ospedale della Pieta on whose outer walls there is a hole just big enough to stick a bowling pin through. Underneath reads a plaque which damns to hell the person who slips any infant other than a true orphan through the small passage to the indoors. It was within this orphanage that Vivaldi worked for most of his life, where he taught the girls who had been slipped through as newborns how to play music. And it was here that he composed his incomparable The Four Seasons.
Besides teaching, Vivaldi was a virtuoso violinist as well as composer, and of his 500-plus concertos, 221 are for violin written most likely for himself. Although it’s unknown when the concertos of The Four Seasons were composed, they were first published in 1725 in a larger set titled The Test of Harmony and Invention. Since then, they have become so famous as to almost eclipse the composer himself – so rich in tunefulness and inventiveness, so exceptional in their virtuoso violin solos – indeed, their inspired beauty nearly defy time, place and composer.
One lesser known aspect of the Seasons is that the orchestral parts are accompanied by detailed programs (storylines) which explain many of this timeless masterpiece’s ingeniously clever musical moments. In the original 1725 publication Vivaldi even provided four of his own seasonally-inspired sonnets. As an example of this program-music, the sonnet for Spring describes, in part: bird song, then the babbling brooks of Spring, followed by a storm and then a return of the birds. Once this is known, the musical imitation is almost impossible to miss (the trilling of the strings representing birdsong, the undulating string motives echoing the running brooks, and so on).
Antonio Vivaldi’s Sonnets to the Four Seasons
Spring
1. Spring has come and joyfully the birds greet it with happy song, and the brooks, while the streams flow along with gentle murmur as the zephyrs blow. There come, shrouding the air with a black cloak, lighting and thunder chosen to herald [the storm]; then, when these are silent, the little birds return to their melodious incantations.
2. And now, in the pleasant, flowery meadow, to the soft murmur of leaves and plants, the goatherd sleeps with his faithful dog at his side.
3. To the festive sound of a pastoral bagpipe, nymphs and shepherds dance under their beloved roof, greeting the glittering arrival of the spring.
Summer
1. In the harsh season scorched by the sun, man and flock languish, and the pine is on fire; the cuckoo begins to call and soon after, the turtledove and the goldfinch are heard singing. Zephyr [the west wind] gently blows, but Boreas [the north wind] suddenly enters into a contest with its neighbor, and the little shepherd weeps for he hears the awesome threatening storm and his fate.
2. To his tired limbs rest is denied by the fear of lightning, awesome thunder, and the furious swarm of flies and hornets!
3. Alas, his fears are justified. The sky is filled with thunder and lightning and hail cuts down the proud grain.
Autumn
1. The peasant celebrates the pleasure of the happy harvest with dances and songs; and inflamed by the liquor of Bacchus, many end their rejoicing with sleep.
2. The mild pleasant air makes all abandon dance and song; this is the season that invites all to the sweet delights of peaceful sleep.
3. The hunters, at the break of dawn, set forth with horns, guns, and hounds. The animal flees, and they follow its tracks. Already frightened and tired by the great noise of guns and hounds, the wounded animal makes a weak attempt at fleeing, but is overcome and dies.
Winter
1. Trembling with cold amidst the freezing snow, while a frightful wind harshly blows, running and stamping one’s feet every minute, and feeling one’s teeth chatter from the extreme cold;
2. Spending quiet contented days by the fire while the rain outside drenches people by the hundreds;
3. Walking on ice, and moving cautiously, with slow steps, for fear of falling, spinning around, slipping, falling down, again walking on ice and running fast until the ice cracks and splits; hearing Sirocco, Boreas, and all the winds at war burst forth from the bolted doors – this is winter, but it also brings joy!
https://www.friendswv.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/FOM_logo_340x156-300x138.jpg00Jen Rolstonhttps://www.friendswv.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/FOM_logo_340x156-300x138.jpgJen Rolston2016-03-14 11:41:442016-07-13 11:22:33Pushing the Season: March 12, 2016
Panamanian Dances (Danzas de Panama) for String Quartet
William Grant Still
(Born in Woodville, Missouri in 1895; died in Los Angeles in 1978)
Tamborito – (“Little drum”)
Mejorana y Socavón – (2 Dances: “Marjoram” and “Tunnel [where an image of the Virgin Mary was reported in an old mineshaft in Panama in 1756]”)
Punto – (“Point[ing]”) – Allegretto con grazia
Cumbia y Congo – (2 Dance names)
In 1955, when most African-American citizens in the South couldn’t even drink out of the same water fountain as their white neighbors, composer William Grant Still achieved a breakthrough – he was the first African-American to conduct the New Orleans Philharmonic. It was only one of the many steps toward racial equality (in that same year, Rosa Parks was arrested in Alabama for refusing to obey bus segregation), but in the Deep South in 1955 Still’s accomplishment was extraordinary. That 1955 concert highlighted several of Still’s own works, including his Afro-American Symphony (Symphony No. 1, 1930), in which Still was just mastering the technique of giving voice to African-American song and rhythm in the “classical” Neo-Romantic style. If George Gershwin started that idea in 1924 with his Rhapsody in Blue, then Still carried it further into the concert hall and perfected it. Such is the case with his marvelous Panamanian Dances for string quartet which he premiered in 1948. Still incorporated not only African-American elements, but as the title’s “Panama” suggests, also Spanish and Native Central American Indian elements as well. These Dances are filled with ingenious details, such as the actual percussive elements of the folk dances throughout, where the performers knock on their instruments in the first and last movements. And then there are the evocations of Panamanian folk instruments – the guitars called mejoraneros and the three-stringed violin, the Rabel – during the Mejorana y Socavón (2nd movement), as well as the shoe-tapping portion in the Punto (3rd dance) from the Panamanian dance, the Zapateo. In the final dance, Still brings to life the joyous Afro-Latin dances, the Cumbia and the Congo, evoking women dancing sensuously in the streets during the Congo with candles held high as the men swirl around them in ecstatic abandon.
Lullaby for Strings
George Gershwin
(Born in Brooklyn, NY in 1898; died in Hollywood, CA in 1937)
George Gershwin’s life is one of those great and inspirational American stories. The son of a poor immigrant family in Brooklyn, he worked his way up from nowhere to becoming one of the most famous musicians in the world and having his music hailed as representing America itself. Even in his fame, however, Gershwin continued studying music as his lifelong pursuit. Thus was born his wonderful Lullaby for Strings in 1919, which was composed as an assignment in harmony and counterpoint during his studies. Aside from Lullaby’s gentle hues, its sweet and lazy habanera/swing-like rhythms, and its two infectious and utterly unpretentious themes, one senses a real glow in this work that emerges from these almost hidden harmonies and counterpoint underneath the melodies. Although Gershwin adapted Lullaby into a song in a new show Blue Monday (a one act “jazz-opera,” Gershwin called it, as well as Opera à la Afro-American, 1922), the show flopped. Nonetheless, the famous jazz band leader Paul Whiteman heard Gershwin’s talent, and commissioned him to write a new piece, which turned out to be Rhapsody in Blue. And thus it was that the gentle Lullaby fathered the edgy Rhapsody that transformed American music.
String Quartet No. 12
in F Major, Op. 96, B. 179, “American”
Antonin Dvořák
(Born near Prague, Bohemia (now Czech Republic) in 1841; died in Prague in 1904)
Allegro ma non troppo
Lento
Molto vivace
Vivace ma non troppo
In 1892 the American philanthropist Jeanette Thurber persuaded Czech composer Antonin Dvořák to head her newly formed National Conservatory of Music in New York City for three years. The idea was to foster grassroots classical music training, help grow a Nationalist American music, and be open to all races – most important, to African-Americans. Within a year, Dvořák had composed his Symphony in E-Minor “from the New World,” which according to the composer was influenced by the African-American spirituals (then called “Negro music”) he had been exposed to. Ignoring the racial barriers of the time, Dvořák insisted that in “. . . the Negro melodies of America I discover all that is needed for a great and noble school of music.” Directly after composing the “New World” Symphony, Dvořák took a long summer holiday in 1893 in Spillville, Iowa. This small, country town was everything that the bustling New York City he’d spent the year in was not, including a large community of Czech immigrants. Amidst nature and his countrymen, Dvořák overflowed with musical ideas. Within 3 days he sketched out his entire String Quartet No. 12, later nicknamed the “American,” and finished it in another 13 days. Probably the most beloved String Quartet in the repertoire, the American is beautiful and robust, folksy and sophisticated. There is no movement without a gorgeous melody, and equally enticing are their delightful accompaniments, with syncopated ostinatos on par with Joplin’s and chock full of inventiveness. Especially enchanting is the magical second movement (Lento), where a sorrowful tune wafts above the soft undulations of the other strings, and where the harmonies could melt sunsets. The American is unreservedly a masterpiece and crowd pleaser.
But what of the folk songs and African-American influences so often mentioned as sources for these “American” pieces? The only confirmed American “song” comes in the third movement of this Quartet, the bird song of the beautiful Scarlet Tanager, whose insistent singing apparently annoyed Dvořák during his work, and so he transcribed it and memorialized it in the third movement (Molto vivace). All the same, Dvořák felt that just by being in America and hearing a new type of music was enough to inspire him to write in a different way – as if he were hearing with different ears. And so two of Western music’s great masterpieces were created during Dvořák’s tenure in America, and thanks to him and Jeanette Thurber, a serious interest in African-American music began to take root, helping to pave the way for other composers to plumb African-American music to its fullest in the popular as well as the classical vein.
Three Rags by
Scott Joplin
(arranged for String Quartet)
Scott Joplin
(Born in Texarkana, Texas (uncertain) in 1867 or 1868; died in New York City in 1917)
The Entertainer
Solace
Maple Leaf Rag
As popular as it is today, it seems almost impossible that anyone in the western world could never have heard Joplin’s magnificent classic rag The Entertainer (c. 1900). This perfect little piece of music is both jazzy and classical, upbeat and melancholy, and features that rarest of all musical occurrences — an almost instantly memorable main theme. It is as melodiously perfect as a Souza March or a Rossini Overture. Such is the genius of America’s greatest ragtime composer, Scott Joplin, but his fame only really began a half century after his death when his rags were featured in the 1973 classic film The Sting (starring Paul Newman and Robert Redford). In his own lifetime, Joplin’s popularity was sporadic, ending in poverty and an early death. He was buried in an unmarked grave in 1917 at the age of 49, and by the 1920’s he was all but forgotten. But his 1897 rag, the Maple Leaf Rag (the closing piece in this arrangement), had brought Joplin some brief fame. This piece more than any other perfected the ragtime genre – which previously was known condescendingly as “bordello music” – and became the most important influence on the musical form that soon blossomed into Jazz. What was so inspiring about Maple Leaf was its catchy melodic lines and its delightfully infectious character, but also its sophisticated harmonies and intelligent syncopations. As musicologist Bill Ryerson explained it, Joplin’s Maple Leaf Rag did for ragtime (and soon Jazz) what Chopin did for the Polish mazurka. Quite different in tone, however, is Solace (also subtitled “Mexican Serenade,” the second rag in this arrangement), which Joplin wrote in 1909. Here the rich harmonies and melancholic sentiment are the true gems – the syncopated top line saunters almost like an afterthought to a remarkably moving and tuneful piece. Joplin wrote his rags as classical pieces of music informed strongly by African-American influences, and their exceptional quality played a tremendous role in shaping the direction of American music.
https://www.friendswv.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/FOM_logo_340x156-300x138.jpg00Jen Rolstonhttps://www.friendswv.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/FOM_logo_340x156-300x138.jpgJen Rolston2016-01-21 17:35:182016-07-13 11:22:33Martin Luther King Holiday Concert: January 16, 2016
Infinite Wind: April 9, 2016
Program NotesTrios Pièces Brèves
Jacques Ibert
(Born in Paris in 1890; died in Paris in 1962)
Trois Pièces Brèves
1. Assez lent, allegro scherzando
2. Andante
3. Allegro
French composer Jacques Ibert was one of the early 20th Century composers to rediscover the wind quintet as a form, though he composed only one. In the wake of a turbulent new millennium and World War I which thrust the Western world into a new modernity, composers began balking at the excesses of the Romantic Era of music. No longer did gargantuan orchestras and extremely long, pathos-driven music seem appropriate for composer or audience. So some looked backwards and Neo-Classicism was born. This was a return to simplicity, clean lines and structural forms, wrapped in 20th Century harmony. Ibert, one of “Les Six” of French composers looking for new musical expression, was for a time at the forefront of Neo-Classicism. In 1930 he turned to the Classical promise of the wind quintet, and from that was born one of his most cherished chamber works: Trois Pièces Brèves.
Ibert’s charming Quintet shows him at his colorful and inventive best. Ibert fashioned it so that its movements could be played in any order or independently, without any compromise to the work as a whole. He found the five-wind ensemble to be an opportunity to show boundless colors in simple combinations. He also delighted in writing works as sheer entertainment, which Trois Pièces Brèves provides brilliantly. The rather puffed-up, and lovely, introductory fanfare of the first movement becomes gently sarcastic when it devolves into a bird-call passage. More wittiness follows when the sprightly march-like theme evolves into a waltz. The march and waltz then battle for supremacy, and Ibert chooses the dance. The second movement is a surprise in color and beauty from only two instruments, the flute and clarinet, ending by adding a few more instruments to prepare for the jocular third movement. In the finale, Ibert again flexes his talent for sonority – all five instruments here combine for some wonderful colors and a whirlwind of whim and fun. A slightly drunken jig-like theme is punctuated with vocalistic roulades (a flurry of quick notes just before the next note in a melody), and hints of good old-fashioned 1930’s dance hall music. Trois Pièces Brèves is a delicious wonder.
Milonga Sin Palabras
Ástor Pantaleón Piazzolla
(Born in Mar del Plata, Argentina in 1921; died in Buenos Aires in 1992)
From the time Argentinian-born Ástor Piazzolla was given the large keyboard accordion known as a bandoneón at around the age of eight until his death, Piazzolla was irretrievably drawn into the world of the tango. He became famous for his “Nuevo tango” in the 1960’s, a reinvigoration of Argentina’s “national” music that he derived from his formula of “tango + tragedy + comedy + whorehouse.” Though Piazzolla’s large output of music rests mainly on tango music with its distinctive dance rhythms, he was indeed a musical polyglot. Bach, Stravinsky, Hindemith, klezmer, jazz, popular music and a keen interest in traditional folk music all figure into his works, and so it was that he turned to his hometown of Mar del Plata to investigate its famous folksong and dance, the milonga.
The milonga had become popular in the 1870’s, growing out of a wonderful folk tradition called payada de contrapunto, a several hour to several day competition between two payadors (singers), who exchanged dueling verse to each other’s questions of life and love, usually ending with insults. Dance began to accompany the song form as it morphed into the milonga, and the combination of dance and milonga became regarded as an “excited habanera.” Piazzolla originally composed his Milonga Sin Palabras (“milonga without words”) for his wife in 1979 for bandoneón and piano. It soon became immensely popular and it was arranged for wind quintet by William Scribner. In Milonga Sin Palabras, Piazzolla again treats an old form through the filters of newer popular music. His Milonga wafts pensively but casually, with the rhythms and flickers of dance infusing it, yet its gentle lyricism adding depth and soul and timelessness. Beautifully crafted, Piazzolla’s Milonga seems to be returning to this old form, heard through the ears of ghosts who, while nostalgically remembering the old vocal competitions, infuse it with both new harmonies and melancholy.
Quintet in B-flat, Op. 56
Franz Ignaz Danzi
(Born in Schwetzingen, Germany in 1763; died in Karlsruhe, Germany in 1826)
Quintet in B-flat Major, Op. 56, No. 1
1. Allegro
2. Andante con motoa
3. Menuett – Trio
4. Allegro
After Giuseppi Cambini “invented” the wind quintet ensemble in the early 1800’s, two composers in particular took a keen interest and were influential in establishing the genre in the concert hall. First was Czech composer Anton Reicha (1770 – 1836) who composed 24 Quintets not long after Cambini’s, followed by German composer Franz Danzi and his 9 Quintets that were written most likely in the period 1820-24. These 33 works have become the foundation of the repertoire. Danzi was a highly respected cellist, composer and teacher in a long career that was witness to Mozart’s last years and Beethoven’s entire career, as well as being a mentor to Carl Maria von Weber. As a composer in his own right, he contributed to nearly every genre of the day and often with impressive works. Most impressive and most memorable are his Quintets, and his first three published as Opus 56 have remained deservedly popular.
The Wind Quintet No. 1 (of Op. 56) is an impressive and sparkling little masterwork in its genre, imbued with that wonderful late Classical spirit, light and airy, masterfully balanced and full of energy. The harmonies are clearly looking forward to the Romantic era, and the themes, breezy as they appear, are rich and often hint at something much deeper than just light entertainment. The second movement is quite the gem, featuring the double reeds (first oboe, then bassoon), in a rather wistful funeral cortege that is filled with ambiguity and bittersweet sentiment. Then the double reeds hands the baton to the flute and clarinet, creating a wonderful changing of light and color in the ensemble. Likewise, the Trio (middle) section of the third movement presents a masterful sequence as the theme is exchanged between each member of the quintet. The entire work is ripe with these ingenious techniques, and as charmingly as they fall upon our ears, the work is equally heady. Most impressive still is how Danzi, the cellist, captured the capabilities of each wind instrument with remarkable idiomatic wisdom.
Quintet in C, Op. 79
August Friedrich Klughardt
(Born in Köthen, Germany in 1847; died in Rosslau, Germany in 1902)
Wind Quintet in C-Major, Op. 79
1. Allegro non troppo
2. Allegro vivace
3. Andante grazioso
4. Adagio – Allegro molto vivace
Despite Danzi’s contributions to the quintet repertoire, the string quartet still held considerable cache with composers. But at the turning of the 20th Century, two important musical forces were underway. First was the war that raged over the future of music – the “New German School” of music (the tone poems of Liszt and the operas of Wagner) vying with the “Conservative” composers (the symphonies of Brahms and Schumann). The second transformation was at once mechanical and musical. Technological advancements to wind instruments were making them more agile, with wider ranges, transforming the music they could play.
Into this mix came August Klughardt who, in his youth, adored Liszt. But late in his life he began to appreciate deeply the Conservative path. The result was something magical producing a wonderful combination of both ideologies. With the richness and nimbleness now available in wind instruments and his growing fondness for conservative musical structures, Klughardt wrote his Wind Quintet between 1898-1901. It has become one of the cornerstones of the repertoire for both its Classical clarity and its deeply Romantic underpinnings.
Perhaps as no other composer, Klughardt understood the possibilities of this particular set of instruments and how “orchestral” they could sound, and how they could also bridge the gap between the two “Schools.” The first movement delves into lush melodies over rich and complex harmonies – a nod to his New German School forebears. The second movement, simple and bucolic, acknowledges Conservative aesthetics. The third movement is a magical mix of both Schools, where instrument pairings and inventive timbres create a folktale-like atmosphere – the music is never heavy and yet manages to be richly sonorous. The finale nods to the early Baroque with a somber and beautiful slow introduction, but what follows is an exploitation of just what these five wind instruments can do when set loose, virtuosic and breathtaking to the end.
Highlights from Porgy and Bess
George Gershwin
(Born in Brooklyn, NY in 1898; died in Hollywood, CA in 1937)
Selections from Porgy and Bess for Woodwind Quintet
1. Overture: Catfish Row
2. Summertime
3. A Woman is a Sometimes Thing
4. My Man’s Gone Now
5. I Got Plenty O’ Nuthin’
6. It Ain’t Necessarily So
7. There’s a Boat Dat’s Leabin’ Soon for New York
8. Oh, Lawd, I’m On My Way
Just on the heels of his extraordinary success with Rhapsody in Blue in 1924, Gershwin launched a new musical, Oh, Kay!, in 1926. In the throes of its rehearsals, Gershwin found he couldn’t sleep one night, and he picked up the new and hugely popular novel, Porgy (1924), by American author DuBose Heyward (1885-1940). The composer was enthralled with Heyward’s story about the Gullah-speaking African-Americans living in Charleston hoping to find fishing work on “Catfish Row.” Heyward’s main character, Porgy, was based on a real character he knew named “Goat Sammy,” a crippled man who got his way through town riding a cart pulled by a goat. The novel had all the elements for great theatre: crime, love, the little guy rising up to win the day, and so Gershwin immediately wrote Heyward asking to turn Porgy into an opera he hoped to call Porgy and Bess.
Since his teenage years, Gershwin had been enamored with the idea of writing an opera as the best way to get “popular” music into the Classical world. For various reasons, it would take him another nine years after reading Porgy to complete Porgy and Bess and to premiere it in 1935 in Boston. Historically speaking, it was a triumph of firsts, using an all African-American cast and bringing such a racially-charged piece onto the stage, but it didn’t win over the critics initially. Today, however, the opera Porgy and Bess is recognized as an American masterpiece, and its wonderfully singable songs and arias have been extremely popular in their own right. There is probably no other aria in the American song book as beloved as “Summertime,” and the opera’s almost embarrassing wealth of great music virtually begs to be played in any combination possible. Tonight’s arrangement for woodwind quintet is yet another example of the timeless appeal of Gershwin’s music.
Pushing the Season: March 12, 2016
Program NotesAaron Copland
(Born in Brooklyn, New York in 1900; died in North Tarrytown, New York in 1990)
Appalachian Spring (original version for Chamber Orchestra)
For many, Appalachian Spring has come to represent the “sound of Appalachia” – that ancient chain of low mountains marching up the eastern seaboard, with their dense wilderness, granting views that gently span the horizon through a myriad of brilliant autumnal colors and misty pastels and filled with the folk music of song and fiddles seeming to be as ancient as the mountains themselves. The underlying story of Copland’s ballet is also equally well known: that of a newlywed pioneer family “building a house with joy and love and prayer.” Interestingly, neither the Appalachia theme nor this ballet story appeared in this piece until much later in its creation. Commissioned of Copland in 1942 by the famous American dancer and choreographer, Martha Graham, the grande dame of Modern Dance, together with the Coolidge Foundation, the ballet music that Copland originally conceived of was first titled “Ballet for Martha” and he said that “the music … takes as a point of departure the personality of Martha Graham.” It was only just before the ballet’s premiere in 1944 when Graham herself happened across the lovely phrase that became its title, “Appalachian spring,” finding it in a poem by Hart Crane called The Dance, (from the larger collection titled The Bridge) where the “spring” referred to a water source, not the season. Although a basic outline of the ballet’s story existed from the start, most of the details that we know today were hammered out in the several months prior to its premiere.
Two aspects in the commissioning of Appalachian Spring, however, were essential to its creation from the very beginning: the music had be danceable, and it must be “American” sounding. And these two aspects Copland undeniably achieved in this, his greatest masterpiece. American born and bred, Appalachian Spring has remained peerless as the music that captures the spirit of America. To be sure, its musical canvas conveys a humility and newness that has become easily attached to a nostalgic American perception of itself, and one of its most beloved melodies, the beautiful hymn tune “Simple Gifts*,” gives the musical score a deeply honest and hopeful feel. These characteristics lend themselves wonderfully to any dance interpretation. Originally scored for 13 instruments (1 flute, 1 clarinet, 1 bassoon, piano and strings) to be danced in the small Coolidge Auditorium in the Library of Congress, Washington, DC, Copland revised and condensed the score in 1945 into a suite for full orchestra, now its most well known version. The original version, however, retains its own wonderful charm and is a delight to listen to, especially when accompanied by dance.
The underlying story, according to the original published score, is as follows:
“…a pioneer celebration in spring around a newly-built farmhouse in the Pennsylvania hills in the early part of the last century [1800’s]. The bride-to-be and the young farmer-husband enact the emotions, joyful and apprehensive, their domestic partnership invites. An older neighbor suggests now and then the rocky confidence of experience. A revivalist and his followers remind the new householders of the strange and terrible aspects of human fate. At the end the couple is left quiet and strong in their new house.”
*A note about the tune “Simple Gifts”: The Shakers, a break-off sect from the Quakers, emigrated from England to America in 1774. “Shakers” was a pejorative term for the sect describing their lively and ecstatic form of worship, which involved a lot of their own, original music accompanied by swaying and twirling dance. Music played a part in all aspects of Shaker life, and was thought of, dually, as utilitarian and spiritual in essence, and these songs were referred to as work-song-hymns. In 1875, Shaker member Elder Joseph Brackett composed “Simple Gifts.” It was published in a compendium not long afterwards called The Gift to Be Simple: Shaker Rituals and Songs, which is where Copland found it. The song’s lilting, sweet melody and its humble, yet joyful, lyrics seem to capture the essence of Appalachian Spring as well as any description. They are:
‘Tis the gift to be simple, ‘tis the gift to be free;
‘Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be;
And when we find ourselves in the place just right,
‘Twill be in the valley of love and delight.
When true simplicity is gain’d,
To bow and to bend we sha’n’t be asham’d
To turn, turn will be our delight,
‘Til by turning, turning we come round right.
Antonio Vivaldi
(Born in Venice, Italy in 1678; died in Vienna, Austria in 1741)
The Four Seasons, Four Concertos for Violin, Op. 8, Nos. 1-4
I. “Spring” Concerto in E-major
1. Allegro
2. Largo e pianissimo sempre
3. Allegro
II. “Summer” Concerto in G-minor
1. Allegro non molto
2. Adagio
3. Presto
III. “Autumn” Concerto in F-major
1. Allegro
2. Adagio molto
3. Allegro
IV. “Winter” Concerto in F-minor
1. Allegro non molto
2. Largo
3. Allegro
In Venice, just down the quayside from St. Mark’s Square, stands a building called Ospedale della Pieta on whose outer walls there is a hole just big enough to stick a bowling pin through. Underneath reads a plaque which damns to hell the person who slips any infant other than a true orphan through the small passage to the indoors. It was within this orphanage that Vivaldi worked for most of his life, where he taught the girls who had been slipped through as newborns how to play music. And it was here that he composed his incomparable The Four Seasons.
Besides teaching, Vivaldi was a virtuoso violinist as well as composer, and of his 500-plus concertos, 221 are for violin written most likely for himself. Although it’s unknown when the concertos of The Four Seasons were composed, they were first published in 1725 in a larger set titled The Test of Harmony and Invention. Since then, they have become so famous as to almost eclipse the composer himself – so rich in tunefulness and inventiveness, so exceptional in their virtuoso violin solos – indeed, their inspired beauty nearly defy time, place and composer.
One lesser known aspect of the Seasons is that the orchestral parts are accompanied by detailed programs (storylines) which explain many of this timeless masterpiece’s ingeniously clever musical moments. In the original 1725 publication Vivaldi even provided four of his own seasonally-inspired sonnets. As an example of this program-music, the sonnet for Spring describes, in part: bird song, then the babbling brooks of Spring, followed by a storm and then a return of the birds. Once this is known, the musical imitation is almost impossible to miss (the trilling of the strings representing birdsong, the undulating string motives echoing the running brooks, and so on).
Antonio Vivaldi’s Sonnets to the Four Seasons
Spring
1. Spring has come and joyfully the birds greet it with happy song, and the brooks, while the streams flow along with gentle murmur as the zephyrs blow. There come, shrouding the air with a black cloak, lighting and thunder chosen to herald [the storm]; then, when these are silent, the little birds return to their melodious incantations.
2. And now, in the pleasant, flowery meadow, to the soft murmur of leaves and plants, the goatherd sleeps with his faithful dog at his side.
3. To the festive sound of a pastoral bagpipe, nymphs and shepherds dance under their beloved roof, greeting the glittering arrival of the spring.
Summer
1. In the harsh season scorched by the sun, man and flock languish, and the pine is on fire; the cuckoo begins to call and soon after, the turtledove and the goldfinch are heard singing. Zephyr [the west wind] gently blows, but Boreas [the north wind] suddenly enters into a contest with its neighbor, and the little shepherd weeps for he hears the awesome threatening storm and his fate.
2. To his tired limbs rest is denied by the fear of lightning, awesome thunder, and the furious swarm of flies and hornets!
3. Alas, his fears are justified. The sky is filled with thunder and lightning and hail cuts down the proud grain.
Autumn
1. The peasant celebrates the pleasure of the happy harvest with dances and songs; and inflamed by the liquor of Bacchus, many end their rejoicing with sleep.
2. The mild pleasant air makes all abandon dance and song; this is the season that invites all to the sweet delights of peaceful sleep.
3. The hunters, at the break of dawn, set forth with horns, guns, and hounds. The animal flees, and they follow its tracks. Already frightened and tired by the great noise of guns and hounds, the wounded animal makes a weak attempt at fleeing, but is overcome and dies.
Winter
1. Trembling with cold amidst the freezing snow, while a frightful wind harshly blows, running and stamping one’s feet every minute, and feeling one’s teeth chatter from the extreme cold;
2. Spending quiet contented days by the fire while the rain outside drenches people by the hundreds;
3. Walking on ice, and moving cautiously, with slow steps, for fear of falling, spinning around, slipping, falling down, again walking on ice and running fast until the ice cracks and splits; hearing Sirocco, Boreas, and all the winds at war burst forth from the bolted doors – this is winter, but it also brings joy!
Program notes © Max Derrickson
Martin Luther King Holiday Concert: January 16, 2016
Program NotesPanamanian Dances
(Danzas de Panama) for String Quartet
William Grant Still
(Born in Woodville, Missouri in 1895; died in Los Angeles in 1978)
In 1955, when most African-American citizens in the South couldn’t even drink out of the same water fountain as their white neighbors, composer William Grant Still achieved a breakthrough – he was the first African-American to conduct the New Orleans Philharmonic. It was only one of the many steps toward racial equality (in that same year, Rosa Parks was arrested in Alabama for refusing to obey bus segregation), but in the Deep South in 1955 Still’s accomplishment was extraordinary. That 1955 concert highlighted several of Still’s own works, including his Afro-American Symphony (Symphony No. 1, 1930), in which Still was just mastering the technique of giving voice to African-American song and rhythm in the “classical” Neo-Romantic style. If George Gershwin started that idea in 1924 with his Rhapsody in Blue, then Still carried it further into the concert hall and perfected it. Such is the case with his marvelous Panamanian Dances for string quartet which he premiered in 1948. Still incorporated not only African-American elements, but as the title’s “Panama” suggests, also Spanish and Native Central American Indian elements as well. These Dances are filled with ingenious details, such as the actual percussive elements of the folk dances throughout, where the performers knock on their instruments in the first and last movements. And then there are the evocations of Panamanian folk instruments – the guitars called mejoraneros and the three-stringed violin, the Rabel – during the Mejorana y Socavón (2nd movement), as well as the shoe-tapping portion in the Punto (3rd dance) from the Panamanian dance, the Zapateo. In the final dance, Still brings to life the joyous Afro-Latin dances, the Cumbia and the Congo, evoking women dancing sensuously in the streets during the Congo with candles held high as the men swirl around them in ecstatic abandon.
Lullaby for Strings
George Gershwin
(Born in Brooklyn, NY in 1898; died in Hollywood, CA in 1937)
George Gershwin’s life is one of those great and inspirational American stories. The son of a poor immigrant family in Brooklyn, he worked his way up from nowhere to becoming one of the most famous musicians in the world and having his music hailed as representing America itself. Even in his fame, however, Gershwin continued studying music as his lifelong pursuit. Thus was born his wonderful Lullaby for Strings in 1919, which was composed as an assignment in harmony and counterpoint during his studies. Aside from Lullaby’s gentle hues, its sweet and lazy habanera/swing-like rhythms, and its two infectious and utterly unpretentious themes, one senses a real glow in this work that emerges from these almost hidden harmonies and counterpoint underneath the melodies. Although Gershwin adapted Lullaby into a song in a new show Blue Monday (a one act “jazz-opera,” Gershwin called it, as well as Opera à la Afro-American, 1922), the show flopped. Nonetheless, the famous jazz band leader Paul Whiteman heard Gershwin’s talent, and commissioned him to write a new piece, which turned out to be Rhapsody in Blue. And thus it was that the gentle Lullaby fathered the edgy Rhapsody that transformed American music.
String Quartet No. 12
in F Major, Op. 96, B. 179, “American”
Antonin Dvořák
(Born near Prague, Bohemia (now Czech Republic) in 1841; died in Prague in 1904)
In 1892 the American philanthropist Jeanette Thurber persuaded Czech composer Antonin Dvořák to head her newly formed National Conservatory of Music in New York City for three years. The idea was to foster grassroots classical music training, help grow a Nationalist American music, and be open to all races – most important, to African-Americans. Within a year, Dvořák had composed his Symphony in E-Minor “from the New World,” which according to the composer was influenced by the African-American spirituals (then called “Negro music”) he had been exposed to. Ignoring the racial barriers of the time, Dvořák insisted that in “. . . the Negro melodies of America I discover all that is needed for a great and noble school of music.” Directly after composing the “New World” Symphony, Dvořák took a long summer holiday in 1893 in Spillville, Iowa. This small, country town was everything that the bustling New York City he’d spent the year in was not, including a large community of Czech immigrants. Amidst nature and his countrymen, Dvořák overflowed with musical ideas. Within 3 days he sketched out his entire String Quartet No. 12, later nicknamed the “American,” and finished it in another 13 days. Probably the most beloved String Quartet in the repertoire, the American is beautiful and robust, folksy and sophisticated. There is no movement without a gorgeous melody, and equally enticing are their delightful accompaniments, with syncopated ostinatos on par with Joplin’s and chock full of inventiveness. Especially enchanting is the magical second movement (Lento), where a sorrowful tune wafts above the soft undulations of the other strings, and where the harmonies could melt sunsets. The American is unreservedly a masterpiece and crowd pleaser.
But what of the folk songs and African-American influences so often mentioned as sources for these “American” pieces? The only confirmed American “song” comes in the third movement of this Quartet, the bird song of the beautiful Scarlet Tanager, whose insistent singing apparently annoyed Dvořák during his work, and so he transcribed it and memorialized it in the third movement (Molto vivace). All the same, Dvořák felt that just by being in America and hearing a new type of music was enough to inspire him to write in a different way – as if he were hearing with different ears. And so two of Western music’s great masterpieces were created during Dvořák’s tenure in America, and thanks to him and Jeanette Thurber, a serious interest in African-American music began to take root, helping to pave the way for other composers to plumb African-American music to its fullest in the popular as well as the classical vein.
Three Rags by
Scott Joplin
(arranged for String Quartet)
Scott Joplin
(Born in Texarkana, Texas (uncertain) in 1867 or 1868; died in New York City in 1917)
As popular as it is today, it seems almost impossible that anyone in the western world could never have heard Joplin’s magnificent classic rag The Entertainer (c. 1900). This perfect little piece of music is both jazzy and classical, upbeat and melancholy, and features that rarest of all musical occurrences — an almost instantly memorable main theme. It is as melodiously perfect as a Souza March or a Rossini Overture. Such is the genius of America’s greatest ragtime composer, Scott Joplin, but his fame only really began a half century after his death when his rags were featured in the 1973 classic film The Sting (starring Paul Newman and Robert Redford). In his own lifetime, Joplin’s popularity was sporadic, ending in poverty and an early death. He was buried in an unmarked grave in 1917 at the age of 49, and by the 1920’s he was all but forgotten. But his 1897 rag, the Maple Leaf Rag (the closing piece in this arrangement), had brought Joplin some brief fame. This piece more than any other perfected the ragtime genre – which previously was known condescendingly as “bordello music” – and became the most important influence on the musical form that soon blossomed into Jazz. What was so inspiring about Maple Leaf was its catchy melodic lines and its delightfully infectious character, but also its sophisticated harmonies and intelligent syncopations. As musicologist Bill Ryerson explained it, Joplin’s Maple Leaf Rag did for ragtime (and soon Jazz) what Chopin did for the Polish mazurka. Quite different in tone, however, is Solace (also subtitled “Mexican Serenade,” the second rag in this arrangement), which Joplin wrote in 1909. Here the rich harmonies and melancholic sentiment are the true gems – the syncopated top line saunters almost like an afterthought to a remarkably moving and tuneful piece. Joplin wrote his rags as classical pieces of music informed strongly by African-American influences, and their exceptional quality played a tremendous role in shaping the direction of American music.