Symphonic Dances

Antonin Dvorák (1841-1904) wrote his first set of Slavonic Dances, Op. 46, in 1877 at the request of the Berlin publisher, Fritz Simrock. Simrock had a keen sense of the popular taste of the time and knew Dvorák could emulate the success of Brahms’ earlier Hungarian Dances. It was Brahms himself who had introduced the young Czech composer to Simrock. “He is decidedly a talented person and, besides that, a poor man,” wrote Brahms in an effort to advance Dvorák’s career. Dvorák was practically unknown outside his native Czechoslovakia but Brahms already admired him greatly and was determined to bring his talent to a wider public. Unlike Brahms, who had arranged existing folk melodies in his dances, Dvorák wrote original compositions, using the rhythms and spirit of his native folk music. The Slavonic Dances glow with an infectious charm and an irresistible blend of simplicity and vitality, but their success is also due to the composer’s skill in counterpoint and orchestration. At a time when practically all the peoples of Europe were looking for Nationalistic identification, these dances (and many other folk-inspired works) gave native audiences a new connection to their homeland, and gave foreign audiences an invigorating breath of an exotic culture.

In 1765 Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) began to keep a systematic catalogue of his works. He had been admonished by his employer, Prince Nicolaus von Esterházy, for ‘negligence’ and wanted to show the Prince how busy he had been at work. That catalogue, which has been preserved, lists a concerto for cello and orchestra in C Major that for many years was considered lost. Then in 1961 the score was unearthed in the Czech National Library. It bore the signature of Joseph Weigl Sr., Haydn's cellist, who was in the service of the Esterházy court from 1761 to 1768, and for whom Haydn most likely wrote the piece. Though Haydn is best known as a composer of symphonies (104 of them) he also wrote in a tremendous variety of forms during his 29 years as Kapellmeister to the Esterházy family. A concerto was a favorite vehicle to show off a member of the Prince's orchestra, which Haydn developed into one of the finest ensembles in Europe by recruiting virtuoso players on every instrument.

Composed less than 15 years after Bach’s death, this early work of Haydn’s is in many ways closer in style to late Baroque works than to the best known Classical concertos, and offers a good glimpse of Haydn’s early style. Rather than the broad discourse on clearly delineated themes common to late Classical style, we find shorter themes, motifs that are interwoven rather freely. In his developments, Haydn adheres to the main melodic shapes and key range rather than exploring exotic harmonies and changing the melodic motifs. These Baroque traits make for a leaner, more terse structure, and because Haydn has abandoned the dense counterpoint of the Baroque for clearer textures, the result is a direct, bracing style in which character and expression jump to the forefront.

The first movement begins in the proud, ceremonial tone that Haydn associated with C major, while the solo cello’s elaboration emphasizes some of the more lyrical themes. The development stays close to home in keys and melodic structure but has no lack of virtuoso demands for the soloist. The second movement is notable for the intense feeling within the melodies. It may have been the richness of the cello sound that inspired Haydn to this depth of emotion. The Finale is pure excitement – rapid articulations and headlong speed – a real showpiece for the soloist.

John Williams (b. 1932) wrote a touching score for Steven Spielberg’s 1993 film, Schindler’s List. Williams was known principally for a different kind of film - Star Wars, Jaws, Indiana Jones, ET – but used the opportunity to display his wide range of talents. He wrote, “The film’s ennobling story, set in the midst of the tragedy of the Holocaust, offered an opportunity to create not only dramatic music, but also themes that reflected the more tender and nostalgic aspects of Jewish life during these turbulent years.”

Serge Rachmaninoff (1873-1943) was one of the greatest pianists of all time and the last of the great Russian romantics. His life bridged between two very different worlds: he came of age within the rigid class structure of Czarist Russia and spent the latter part of his life in the anything-goes craziness of Hollywood. Along with the political upheaval of the time, the western world underwent an enormous shift of esthetics from the Romantic to the Modernist era. But Rachmaninoff, born not ten years before the great Russian modernist, Stravinsky, somehow had been immunized to these changes. He wrote, "I cannot cast out the old way of writing and I cannot acquire the new. I have made intensive efforts to feel the musical manner of today, but it will not come to me."

In 1895 his first symphony suffered a sloppy premiere and an unsympathetic reception that threw him into a years-long depression, seriously hampering his progress as a composer. But by 1909 he had fully reclaimed his artistic vision and was triumphant with his Third Piano Concerto, written for his first American tour as a pianist. He left Russia with his family soon after the October Revolution and arrived in New York in 1918. Based in the States, he traveled and toured extensively for the next 25 years. He died at home in Beverly Hills in 1943, after being diagnosed with cancer just two months earlier.

Rachmaninoff’s last completed work, the Symphonic Dances, was written on Long Island, New York, in 1940, during a period of rest and recuperation from touring. The Symphonic Dances are dedicated to conductor Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra, and they served as a showpiece for one of the great virtuoso orchestras of the time. They are a masterpiece of symphonic orchestration, making effective use of alto saxophone, harp, piano, and a large percussion section. Sonic brilliance and rhythmic drive are balanced by Rachmaninoff’s ever-present wistfulness and melancholy, as well as a demonic character, especially in the final movement. Rachmaninoff originally intended to call the piece “Fantastic Dances.” (In the sense of ‘phantasm.’) The  three movements, each of which has an eerie, otherworldly quality, received an individual title, were to be “Noon,” “Twilight” and “Midnight.” “Fantastic” later became “Symphonic” to more accurately describe the work’s ambitious scale and serious intent. The composer certainly develops his themes in an extensive, symphonic manner. Only the middle movement, a slowly lilting and mysterious waltz with a hint of the macabre, is in any sort of regular dance meter. The first movement is something of a fanciful march and the last, a stylized saltarello. The word “Dances” may refer to Rachmaninoff’s unrealized intent to use the work as a ballet score. It was later choreographed successfully for the New York City Ballet, among other companies.

The Dances include several autobiographical references by the composer. Chief among them is the last movement’s increasingly obvious quotations of the Dies irae plainchant, a melody that Rachmaninoff used in many of his works. This musical phrase was first used in the thirteenth century to set the words “Day of wrath” from the Requiem Mass for the dead. Many composers have quoted it – most notably, Hector Berlioz used it to evoke a witches’ Sabbath in his Symphonie fantastique – but none have used it as extensively as Rachmaninoff. What significance it had for the composer is not completely clear. Rachmaninoff very rarely talked about the meaning of his music, and this mystery certainly adds to the atmosphere of the piece. In 1907 he saw Arnold Böcklin's 1886 painting, Isle of the Dead and within two years had composed a tone poem of that same name that reflects the yearning for a peaceful end depicted in the painting. Certainly in 1940, at the age of 67, the composer increasingly may have been preoccupied with death. Other sounds from the Russian church appear frequently in his music, notably men’s choirs and bells. But Rachmaninoff was not a particularly religious man, and part of the attraction of the Dies irae may have been simply that it lends itself well to compositional elaboration.

The dark and vehement Dies irae theme dominates the last movement, but toward the very end of the work it is brought into question by the appearance of another theme. The new theme is derived from the Russian Orthodox chant “Blessed is the Lord” and was used by the composer in his choral work All-night Vigil (also called Vespers). The melodic contour of this theme is similar enough to the Dies irae that it appears as a sort of musical resolution of the earlier theme. Could it be a spiritual resolution of the Day of Wrath as well, intended to symbolize the ultimate victory of life over death? At the point where the chorus sang “Alleluia” in the All-night Vigil, Rachmaninoff wrote that word into the score of the Dances, and at the end of the manuscript he added “I thank Thee, Lord.”

-- Arthur Post