Program - Ravel's Daphnis et Chloé by Colorado Symphony

CLASSICS • 2017/18 Colorado Symphony 2017/18 Season Presenting Sponsor:

RAVEL’S DAPHNIS ET CHLOÉ COLORADO SYMPHONY BRETT MITCHELL, conductor JESSICA RIVERA, soprano COLORADO SYMPHONY CHORUS, DUAIN WOLFE, director This Weekend's Performances are Gratefully Dedicated to Diane Hill and Zach Detra, Co-Chairs of the Advancement Committee Friday, February 2, 2018, at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, February 3, 2018, at 7:30 p.m. Sunday, February 4, 2018, at 1:00 p.m. Boettcher Concert Hall

DEBUSSY Syrinx (for flute alone) Catherine Peterson, flute DEBUSSY

Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun

ESA-PEKKA SALONEN Five Images After Sappho Tell Everyone Without Warning It’s No Use The Evening Star Wedding

— INTERMISSION —

RAVEL

Daphnis et Chloé (complete ballet)

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CLASSICS BIOGRAPHIES BRETT MITCHELL, conductor Hailed for delivering compelling performances of innovative, eclectic programs, Brett Mitchell was named the fourth Music Director of the Colorado Symphony in September 2016. He served as the orchestra’s Music Director Designate during the 2016-17 season, and began his fouryear appointment in September 2017. Mr. Mitchell concluded his tenure as Associate Conductor of The Cleveland Orchestra in August 2017. He joined the orchestra as Assistant Conductor in 2013, and was promoted to Associate Conductor in 2015, becoming the first person to hold that title in over three decades and only the fifth in the orchestra’s hundredyear history. In this role, he led the orchestra in several dozen concerts each season at Severance Hall, Blossom Music Center, and on tour. Mr. Mitchell also served as Music Director of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra (COYO) from 2013 to 2017, which he led on a four-city tour of China in June 2015, marking the ensemble’s second international tour and its first to Asia. In addition to his work in Cleveland and Denver, Mr. Mitchell is in consistent demand as a guest conductor. Recent and upcoming guest engagements include his debuts at the Grant Park Music Festival in downtown Chicago, with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra in Auckland and Wellington, and the San Antonio Symphony, as well as appearances with the Dallas, Detroit, Houston, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, National, and Oregon symphonies, The Cleveland Orchestra, the Rochester Philharmonic, and the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, among others. He has collaborated with such soloists as Yo-Yo Ma, Renée Fleming, Rudolf Buchbinder, James Ehnes, Augustin Hadelich, Leila Josefowicz, and Alisa Weilerstein. From 2007 to 2011, Mr. Mitchell led over one hundred performances as Assistant Conductor of the Houston Symphony, to which he frequently returns as a guest conductor. He also held Assistant Conductor posts with the Orchestre National de France, where he worked under Kurt Masur from 2006 to 2009, and the Castleton Festival, where he worked under Lorin Maazel in 2009 and 2010. In 2015, Mr. Mitchell completed a highly successful five-year appointment as Music Director of the Saginaw Bay Symphony Orchestra, where an increased focus on locally relevant programming and community collaborations resulted in record attendance throughout his tenure. As an opera conductor, Mr. Mitchell has served as music director of nearly a dozen productions, principally at his former post as Music Director of the Moores Opera Center in Houston, where he led eight productions from 2010 to 2013. His repertoire spans the core works of Mozart (The Marriage of Figaro and The Magic Flute), Verdi (Rigoletto and Falstaff), and Stravinsky (The Rake’s Progress) to contemporary works by Adamo (Little Women), Aldridge (Elmer Gantry), Catán (Il Postino and Salsipuedes), and Hagen (Amelia). As a ballet conductor, Mr. Mitchell most recently led a production of The Nutcracker with the Pennsylvania Ballet in collaboration with The Cleveland Orchestra during the 2016-17 season.

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CLASSICS BIOGRAPHIES In addition to his work with professional orchestras, Mr. Mitchell is also well known for his affinity for working with and mentoring young musicians aspiring to be professional orchestral players. His work with COYO during his Cleveland Orchestra tenure was highly praised, and he is regularly invited to work with the highly talented musicians at the Cleveland Institute of Music and the orchestras at this country’s high level training programs, such as the National Repertory Orchestra, Texas Music Festival, and Sarasota Music Festival. Born in Seattle in 1979, Mr. Mitchell holds degrees in conducting from the University of Texas at Austin and composition from Western Washington University, which selected him in as its Young Alumnus of the Year in 2014. He also studied at the National Conducting Institute, and was selected by Kurt Masur as a recipient of the inaugural American Friends of the Mendelssohn Foundation Scholarship. Mr. Mitchell was also one of five recipients of the League of American Orchestras’ American Conducting Fellowship from 2007 to 2010. brettmitchellconductor.com

JESSICA RIVERA, soprano

Possessing a voice praised by the San Francisco Chronicle for its “effortless precision and tonal luster,” Grammy Award-winning soprano Jessica Rivera is one of the most creatively inspired vocal artists before the public today. The intelligence, dimension, and spirituality with which she infuses her performances on great international concert and opera stages has garnered Ms. Rivera unique artistic collaborations with many of today’s most celebrated composers, including John Adams, Osvaldo Golijov, Gabriela Lena Frank, Jonathan Leshnoff, and Nico Muhly, and has brought her together with such esteemed conductors as Sir Simon Rattle, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Robert Spano, Bernard Haitink, and Michael Tilson Thomas. Ms. Rivera has long championed contemporary vocal music, and this season she appears at the Ford Theater in association with LA Opera to reprise her performance of Paola Prestini’s multidisciplinary The Hubble Cantata, which she premiered at the BRIC Festival in Brooklyn in August 2016. In 2017, Ms. Rivera gave the world premiere of Gabriela Lena Frank’s Requiem with the Houston Symphony and Chorus, conducted by Andrés Orozco-Estrada. The artist also performed John Harbison’s Requiem with the Nashville Symphony and Chorus under Giancarlo Guerrero, which was recorded for future release on the Naxos label. Ms. Rivera treasures a long-standing collaboration spanning over a decade with Robert Spano and the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra; she joined Spano on Christopher Theofanidis’s Creation/Creator in Atlanta and at the Kennedy Center’s 2017 SHIFT Festival of American Orchestras, where she also performed Robert Spano’s Hölderlin Lieder, a song cycle written specifically for her and recorded on the ASO Media label. For additional information about Ms. Rivera, please visit www.jessicarivera.com.

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CLASSICS BIOGRAPHIES DUAIN WOLFE, director, Colorado Symphony Chorus Recently awarded two Grammys® for Best Choral Performance and Best Classical Recording, Duain Wolfe is founder and Director of the Colorado Symphony Chorus and Music Director of the Chicago Symphony Chorus. This year marks Wolfe’s 31st season with the Colorado Symphony Chorus. The Chorus has been featured at the Aspen Music Festival for over two decades. Wolfe, who is in his 21st season with the Chicago Symphony Chorus has collaborated with Daniel Barenboim, Pierre Boulez, Bernard Haitink, Riccardo Muti, and the late Sir George Solti on numerous recordings including Wagner’s Die Meistersinger, which won the 1998 Grammy® for Best Opera Recording. Wolfe’s extensive musical accomplishments have resulted in numerous awards, including an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts from the University of Denver, the Bonfils Stanton Award in the Arts and Humanities, the Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts, the Mayor’s Award for Excellence in an Artistic Discipline, and the Michael Korn Award for the Development of the Professional Choral Art. Wolfe is also founder of the Colorado Children’s Chorale, from which he retired in 1999 after 25 years; the Chorale celebrated its 40th anniversary last season. For 20 years, Wolfe also worked with the Central City Opera Festival as chorus director and conductor, founding and directing the company’s young artist residence program, as well as its education and outreach programs. Wolfe’s additional accomplishments include directing and preparing choruses for Chicago’s Ravinia Festival, the Bravo!Vail Festival, the Berkshire Choral Festival, the Aspen Music Festival, and the Grand Teton Music Festival. He has worked with Pinchas Zuckerman as Chorus Director for the Canadian National Arts Centre Orchestra for the past 13 years.

COLORADO SYMPHONY CHORUS The 2017/18 Colorado Symphony Concert Season marks the 34th year of the Colorado Symphony Chorus. Founded in 1984 by Duain Wolfe at the request of Gaetano Delogu, then the Music Director of the Symphony, the chorus has grown over the past three decades, into a nationallyrespected ensemble. This outstanding chorus of 180 volunteers joins the Colorado Symphony for numerous performances, and radio and television broadcasts, to repeat critical acclaim. The Chorus has performed at noted music festivals in the Rocky Mountain region, including the Colorado Music Festival, the Grand Teton Music Festival, and the Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival, where it has performed with the New York Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Orchestra, and the Dallas Symphony. For over two decades, the Chorus has been featured at the world-renowned Aspen Music Festival, performing many great masterworks under the baton of notable conductors Lawrence Foster, James Levine, Murry Sidlin, Leonard Slatkin, Robert Spano, and David Zinman. Among the recordings the Colorado Symphony Chorus has made is a NAXOS release of Roy Harris’s Symphony No. 4. The Chorus is also featured on a recent Hyperion release of the Vaughan Williams Dona Nobis Pacem and Stephen Hough’s Missa Mirabilis. In 2009, in celebration of the 25th anniversary of the Chorus, Duain Wolfe conducted the Chorus on a 3-country, 2-week concert tour of Europe, presenting the Verdi Requiem in Budapest, Vienna, Litomysl, and Prague, and in 2016 the Chorus returned to Europe for concerts in Paris, Strasbourg, and Munich. The Colorado Symphony continues to be grateful for the excellence and dedication of this remarkable, allvolunteer ensemble! For an audition appointment, call 303.308.2483. PROGRAM 4

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CLASSICS BIOGRAPHIES COLORADO SYMPHONY CHORUS Duain Wolfe, founding director and conductor Mary Louise Burke, associate conductor Travis Branam, Taylor Martin, assistant conductors Brian Dukeshier, Hsiao-Ling Lin, Danni Snyder, pianists Eric Israelson, Barbara Porter, chorus managers SOPRANO I Black, Kimberly Brown, Jamie Causey, Denelda Choi, LeEtta H. Coberly, Sarah Deskin, Erin Gile, Jenifer D. Gill, Lori C. Guynn, Erika Heintzkill, MaryTherese Hinkley, Lynnae C. Hittle, Erin R. Hofmeister, Mary Kim, On yoo Knecht, Melanie Look, Cathy Maupin, Anne Medema, Stephanie Moraskie, Wendy L. Porter, Barbara A. Rollins, Haley Ropa, Lori A. Schawel, Camilia Sladovnik, Roberta A. Stegink, Nicole J. Tate, Judy Wuertz, Karen Young, Cara M. SOPRANO II Ahrens, Anna Ascani, Lori Blum, Jude Bohannon, Hailey Borinski, Jackie Bowen, Alex S. Brauchli, Margot L. Coberly, Ruth A. Colbert, Gretchen Cote, Kerry H. Dakkouri, Claudia Gross, Esther J. Kraft, Lisa D.

Kushnir, Marina Machusko, Rebecca E. Montigne, Erin Myers, Heather H. Oâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Nan, Jeannette R. Pflug, Kim Rae, Donneve S. Ruff, Mahli Saddler, Nancy C. Timme, Sydney Travis, Stacey L. Von Roedern, Susan K. Walker, Marcia L. Weinstein, Sherry L. Woodrow, Sandy Zisler, Joan M. ALTO I Adams, Priscilla P. Brady, Lois F. Braud-Kern, Charlotte Clauson, Clair T. Conrad, Jayne M. Daniel, Sheri L. Dunkin, Aubri K. Franz, Kirsten D. Frey, Susie Gayley, Sharon R. Groom, Gabriella D. Guittar, Pat Haller, Emily Hoopes, Kaia M. Kim, Naryoung Lawlor, Betsy McNulty, Emily McWaters, Susan Nordenholz, Kristen Passoth, Ginny Pringle, Jennifer Rudolph, Kathi L. Stevenson, Melanie Thayer, Mary B. Virtue, Pat Voland, Colleen Zelinskaya, Alia

ALTO II Cox, Martha E. Deck, Barbara Dominguez, Joyce Eslick, Carol A. Gangware, Elizabeth Golden, Daniela Hoskins, Hansi Jackson, Brandy H. Janasko, Ellen D. Kibler, Janice London, Carole A. Maltzahn, Joanna K. Marchbank, Barbara J. Nittoli, Leslie M. Schalow, Elle C. Scooros, Pamela R. Townsend, Lisa TENOR I DeMarco, James Dougan, Dustin Gordon, Jr., Frank Jordan, Curt Moraskie, Richard A. Muesing, Garvis J. Nicholas, Timothy W. Reiley, William G. Roach, Eugene Zimmerman, Kenneth A. TENOR II Babcock, Gary E. Bradley, Mac Carlson, James Davies, Dusty R. Fuehrer, Roger Gale, John H. Guittar, Jr., Forrest Kolm, Kenneth E. Martin, Taylor S. Mason, Brandt J. McCracken, Todd Meswarb, Stephen J.

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Milligan, Tom A. Ruth, Ronald L. Seamans, Andrew J. BASS I Adams, John G. Bernhardt, Chase Boyd, Kevin P. Branam, Travis D. Cowen, George Drickey, Robert E. Gray, Matthew Hesse, Douglas D. Mehta, Nalin J. Quarles, Kenneth Ravid, Frederick Rutkowski, Trevor Smith, Benjamin A. Struthers, David R. Wood, Brian W. BASS II Friedlander, Robert Israelson, Eric W. Jackson, Terry L. Kent, Roy A. Millar, Jr., Robert F. Moncrieff, Kenneth Morrison, Greg A. Nuccio, Eugene J. Phillips, John R. Potter, Tom Skillings, Russell R. Skinner, Jack Swanson, Wil W. Taylor, Don

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CLASSICS PROGRAM NOTES CLAUDE DEBUSSY (1862-1918): Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun (Prélude à l’Après-midi d’un faune) Claude Debussy was born August 22, 1862 in St. Germain-en-Laye, near Paris, and died March 25, 1918 in Paris. The Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun was composed 1892-1894 and premiered on December 22, 1894 in Paris, conducted by Gustave Doret. The score calls for three flutes, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, two harps, antique cymbals and strings. Duration is about 10 minutes. Douglas Boyd conducted the last performance of the work on February 26 & 27, 2011. Stéphane Mallarmé (1842-1898) was one of those artists in fin-de-siècle Paris who perceived strong relationships among music, literature and the other arts. A number of his poems, including L’Après-midi d’un faune, (Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun) were not only inspired, he said, by music, but even aspired to its elevated, abstract state. The young composer Claude Debussy had similar feelings about the interaction of poetry and music, and he and Mallarmé became close friends, despite the twenty years difference in their ages. When Mallarmé completed his L’Après-midi d’un faune in 1876 after several years of writing and revising, he envisioned that it would be used as the basis for a theatrical production. Debussy was intrigued at this suggestion, and he set about planning to provide music to a choreographic version that would be devised in consultation with Mallarmé. The projected work was described as Prélude, Interludes et Paraphrase finale to L’Après-midi d’un faune. Debussy completed only the scenario’s first portion, perhaps realizing, as had others, that Mallarmé’s misty symbolism and equivocal language were not innately suited to the theater. The premiere, given at an orchestral concert of the Société Nationale in Paris on December 22, 1894, a few months after the score was finished, was meticulously prepared by the conductor Gustave Doret, with Debussy at his elbow giving instruction and inspiration, polishing details, retouching the scoring. So successful was the initial performance that the audience demanded the work’s immediate encore. L’Après-midi d’un faune was first staged by Diaghilev’s Ballet Russe at the Théâtre du Châtelet on May 29, 1912; Nijinsky created the controversial choreography and appeared in the title role. Mallarmé’s poem is deliberately ambiguous in its sensuous, symbolist language; its purpose is as much to suggest a halcyon, dream-like mood as to tell a story. Robert Lawrence described its slight plot, as realized by Debussy, in his Victor Books of Ballets: “Exotically spotted, a satyr is taking his rest on the top of a hillock. As he fondles a bunch of grapes, he sees a group of nymphs passing on the plain below. He wants to join them, but when he approaches, they flee. Only one of them, attracted by the faun, returns timidly. But the nymph changes her mind and runs away. For a moment he gazes after her. Then, snatching a scarf she has dropped in her flight, the faun climbs his hillock and resumes his drowsy position, astride the scarf.” As the inherent eroticism of the plot suggests, the Debussy/Mallarmé faun is no Bambi-like creature, but rather a mythological half-man, half-beast with cloven hooves, horns, tail and furry coat, a being which walks upright and whose chief characteristic is its highly developed libido. Mallarmé’s poem is filled with the ambiguities symbolized by the faun: is this a man or a beast? is his love physical or fantasy? reality or dream? The delicate subtlety of the poem finds a perfect tonal equivalent in Debussy’s music. The Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun is a seminal work in 20th-century music about which the eminent modernist Pierre Boulez noted, “The flute of the Faun brought new breath to the art PROGRAM 6

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CLASSICS PROGRAM NOTES of music.” Sinuous melodies, exquisite harmonies and a glowing range of orchestral colors were here combined with a jeweler’s precision to produce a limpid sensuality that had never before been broached in music. Like its phrasing and meter, the form of the Prelude is deliberately blurred, unfolding almost as a single, long, improvisational melody begun by the flute and caressed by the other instrumental colors — sometimes just a single tonal strand, sometimes enriched with parallel harmonies. Mallarmé, who was delighted with Debussy’s musical realization of his poem, sent this laudatory verse to the composer: Spirit of the forest, If with your primal breath your flute sounds well, Listen now to the radiance Which comes when Debussy plays.

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ESA-PEKKA SALONEN (BORN IN 1958): Five Images After Sappho for Soprano and Orchestra Esa-Pekka Salonen was born June 30, 1958 in Helsinki. Five Images After Sappho was composed in 1999 and premiered on June 4, 1999 at the Ojai Music Festival in Ojai, California by soprano Laura Claycomb and members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by the composer. The score calls for flute and piccolo, oboe and English horn, clarinet and bass clarinet, bassoon and contrabassoon, two horns, percussion, harp, piano doubling celesta, and string quintet. Duration is about 20 minutes. This is the first performance of the work by the orchestra. Conducting is tough, composing probably even harder, but some of the most brilliant musicians — Busoni, Mahler, Bernstein, Boulez, Previn — have pursued parallel careers in both fields that enriched all facets of their creative personalities. To this select company must be added the Finnish composer-conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen. Born in Helsinki on June 30, 1958, Salonen majored in horn at the Sibelius Conservatory, where he founded a “collective” called Ears Open for promoting and performing new music with Jouni Kaipainen, Magnus Lindberg and Kaija Saariaho, now all major musical figures in Finland. After graduating in 1977, Salonen studied composition privately with Einojuhani Rautavaara and conducting with Jorma Panula, and attended conducting courses in Siena and Darmstadt; he also studied composition with Niccolò Castiglioni and Franco Donatoni in Italy. In 1979, Salonen made his professional conducting debut with the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, and he was soon engaged as a guest conductor across Scandinavia. Successful appearances conducting Wozzeck at the Swedish Royal Opera and the Mahler Symphony No. 3 with the Philharmonia Orchestra of London led to his appointment as conductor of the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra in 1985, a post he held until 1995. He was Principal Guest Conductor of the Oslo Philharmonic from 1984 to 1989, and of the London Philharmonia from 1985 to 1994; he has also held positions with the New Stockholm Chamber Orchestra, Avanti! Chamber Orchestra, Helsinki Festival, Finnish National Opera and Ballet, and London Sinfonietta. Salonen SOUNDINGS

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CLASSICS PROGRAM NOTES made his American debut with the Los Angeles Philharmonic in 1984, and was that orchestra’s music director from 1992 until 2009; he was named the ensemble’s Conductor Laureate in April 2009. Since 2008, he has been Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor of London’s Philharmonia Orchestra. He also continues to guest conduct concerts and opera throughout the world and to serve as artistic director of the Baltic Sea Festival, which he co-founded in 2003. In addition to achieving international recognition as a conductor, Salonen is also a gifted composer, and he has devoted increasing time to his creative work since leaving the Los Angeles Philharmonic. (“I actually think of myself more as a composer than a conductor,” he said in 1998.) His early compositions, including a Saxophone Concerto, an orchestral piece titled Giro and a few works for solo instruments and unconventional chamber groupings, are rooted in the avant-garde enthusiasms of his student days, but since his LA Variations of 1996, written for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, his work has been more immediate and easily approachable. Salonen was the first-ever Creative Chair of the Tonhalle Orchester Zurich in 2014-2015, after which he was appointed to be the Marie-Josée Kravis Composer-in-Residence with the New York Philharmonic for a four-year term. As both composer and conductor, he is the recipient of numerous major awards, including the Grawemeyer Award (for the 2009 Violin Concerto, written for Leila Josefowicz), Nemmers Prize in Musical Composition from Northwestern University, Siena Prize from the Accademia Chigiana (the first conductor ever to receive that distinction), Royal Philharmonic Society’s Opera Award and Conductor Award, Pro Finlandia Medal, Helsinki Medal, and seven honorary doctorates. In 1998, he was awarded the rank of Officier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French government. Musical America named him its “2006 Musician of the Year.” On July 26, 2012, he was chosen to carry the Olympic Flame as part of the 2012 London Summer Games torch relay. Salonen wrote of Five Images After Sappho, co-commissioned in 1999 by the Ojai Festival and London Sinfonietta, “If we imagine the history of art as some kind of Darwinian survival game, Sappho stands out as a genetic miracle. No (almost no) whole organism (poem) has survived; instead we have a couple dozen pages’ worth of fragments. Some of them are almost complete little poems, most of them are isolated groups of words or single words far apart. “Almost every generation of poets has tried to translate these scattered messages from a woman of whom we know very little. As always, interpretation tells more about the interpreter, and his time and culture, than the work itself. Our modern view of Sappho is similar to that of other art forms, more scholarly than romantic. It is important to remember that the best Sappho translation today (or the best Beethoven interpretation) will be seen as interesting, but slightly ridiculous, by future generations. We are prisoners of our own time and generation. “It is the fragmentary nature of the material, and therefore an almost open form, that makes Sappho so fascinating to set to music. (After having typed this sentence I realized that I am still trying to give an intellectual, formal explanation wildly off the mark, in the good old serialist tradition. That is exactly what I mean by being a prisoner of one’s own generation.) It is the tremendous energy of suffocated sexuality and the vibrant eroticism in Sappho that got my imagination going. Sappho reveals to us secrets of the female soul like nobody else. There is no subject more interesting. “Between these small islands of words one can hear music. I set out to compose a cycle in which I would describe a woman’s life from childhood to old age and death, but my timing was not right: my son Oliver was born in the middle of the composition period, and it became totally PROGRAM 8

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CLASSICS PROGRAM NOTES impossible for me to imagine death and loneliness. I decided to concentrate on the first part of life instead. “1. Tell Everyone. The singer explains that she is going to tell a story. The music is fanfare-like, except for the word ‘beautifully.’ “2. Without Warning. The first awakening of love. Descending figures in the beginning are metaphors of a gentle whirlwind. “3. It’s No Use. A young girl is unable to concentrate on household chores. She is trying to explain to her mother why, but gets so excited that she can only stutter. Finally, she manages to get out the words ‘that boy.’ “4. The Evening Star. I imagine: a girl is lying in the grass in the evening, gazing at the stars. For the first time she understands that even she will be old one day. The strings and the celesta describe the flicker of the stars. “5. Wedding. I combined several poems here to create a larger form. The singer has different roles in this song. In the refrain the crowd greets the bridegroom. It returns twice in different guises. After the interlude, the bride has a brief moment of despair, but is comforted by an older woman (‘listen, my dear’), who has a very balanced point of view, in my opinion. After the second refrain, girls gather outside the nuptial chamber and sing a teasing song (‘Come bride’). After the third refrain and an orchestral culmination, a voice describes the couple sleeping peacefully in each other’s arms.” 1. Tell Everyone

4. The Evening Star

Now, today, I shall sing beautifully for my friends’ pleasure

Is the most beautiful of all stars

2. Without Warning

5. Wedding

As a whirlwind swoops an oak Love shakes my heart

Raise up the rafters high, Hurrah for the wedding! Carpenters: higher and higher, Hurrah for the wedding! The bridegroom is equal to Ares, Hurrah for the wedding! Much taller than any tall man is, Hurrah for the wedding! As tall as the singer of Lesbos, Hurrah for the wedding! Towers over all singers of elsewhere, Hurrah for the wedding!

3. It’s No Use Mother dear, I can’t finish my weaving You may blame Aphrodite soft as she is she has almost killed with love for that boy

I think I shall be a maiden forever

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CLASSICS PROGRAM NOTES Listen my dear, By the Goddess herself I swear That I (like you) Had only one Virginity to spare Yet did not fear To go over the bridal line When Hera bade me And cast it from me; So I cheer you on and loudly declare:

[Bridesmaid’s carol I]

“My own night was none Too bad And you my girl Have nothing to fear Nothing at all.”

So, bride, Hesperus lead you Star of the evening Happily onwards Where you shall wonder Where Hera on silver Sits Lady of Marriage.

Come, bride Brimming with roses Of love, bride, Gem of the lovely Goddess of Paphos: Go, bride, Go to the bed where Sweetly and gently You’ll play with your bridegroom:

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CLASSICS PROGRAM NOTES MAURICE RAVEL (1875-1937): Daphnis et Chloé Maurice Ravel was born March 3, 1875 in Ciboure, France and died December 28, 1937 in Paris. Daphnis et Chloé was composed in 1909-1912 and premiered on June 8, 1912 in Paris, conducted by Pierre Monteux. The score calls for three flutes (2nd and 3rd doubling piccolo), alto flute, two oboes, English horn, E-flat clarinet, two B-flat clarinets, bass clarinet, three bassoons, contrabassoon, four horns, four trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, celesta, two harps, strings and mixed chorus. Duration is about 50 minutes. Last performance of the complete Daphnis et Chloé took place on November 22-24, 2013, with Andrew Litton conducting. The Ballet Russe descended on Paris in 1909 with an impact still reverberating through the worlds of art, music and dance. Its brilliant impresario, Sergei Diaghilev, went shopping among the artistic riches of the French capital, and soon had gathered together the most glittering array of creative talent ever assembled under a single banner: Falla, Picasso, Nijinsky, Fokine, Bakst, Monteux, Stravinsky, Massine, Debussy, Matisse, Prokofiev, Pavlova, Poulenc, Milhaud. Early in 1910 Diaghilev approached Maurice Ravel with a scenario by Fokine for a ballet based on a pastoral romance derived from the writings of the 5th-century Greek sophist Longus. In his 1928 autobiographical sketch, Ravel wrote, “I was commissioned by the director of the Russian Ballet to write Daphnis et Chloé, a choreographic symphony in three movements. My aim in writing it was to compose a vast musical fresco, and to be not so much careful about archaic details as loyal to my visionary Greece, which is fairly closely related to the Greece imagined and depicted by French painters at the end of the 18th century. The work is constructed like a symphony, with a very strict system of tonality, formed out of a small number of themes whose development assures homogeneity to the work.” Ravel’s refined view of Daphnis through the eyes of Watteau was at variance with the primitive one held by others on the production staff, especially Léon Bakst, who was doing the stage designs. There were many squabbles and delays in mounting the production, and, as a ballet, Daphnis had a lukewarm reception at its premiere at the Théâtre du Chatelet in Paris on June 8, 1912. Ravel’s score, however, was greeted with enthusiasm, perhaps because the orchestra was the only facet of the production that was completely prepared. The music immediately entered the repertory of the world’s orchestras and has remained one of the most popular of 20th-century scores, though the ballet is rarely seen. One of the marks of a great musical work is the way in which it creates and envelops the listener in its own characteristic world. Ravel, through his masterful orchestration, sensitivity to color and atmosphere, and careful construction, created such a sound world in his Daphnis et Chloé. Ravel’s world is one of elegant sensuality and dream-like refinement, one which grew from the composer’s idealized vision not so much of Greece as of the court of Louis XIV at Versailles and its precise etiquette governing life and love. The young lovers of the ballet are not ancient primitives, but pink-cheeked shepherds who have stepped from a delicate canvas of Fragonard to amuse Le Roi Soleil. In considering the wondrous effect of Daphnis, Jean Cocteau wrote, “It is one of those works that land in the heart like a meteorite, from a planet whose laws will remain forever mysterious and beyond our understanding.” Igor Stravinsky called it “one of the most beautiful products of French music.” The ballet opens in a meadow bordering a sacred wood on the island of Lesbos. At the right is a grotto which contains an altar graced by statues of three Nymphs chiseled from the surrounding natural stone. A great boulder in the left background suggests the shape of the SOUNDINGS

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CLASSICS PROGRAM NOTES god Pan. Greek youths and maidens enter with wreaths and flowers to place at the altar of the Nymphs as the shepherd Daphnis descends from the hills. His lover, Chloé, crosses the meadow to meet him. They join the young Greeks in a solemn dance before the altar. The girls are attracted to the handsome Daphnis, and dance seductively around him, inciting Chloé’s jealousy. Chloé, in her turn, becomes the object of the men’s advances, most particularly a crude one from the clownish goatherd Dorcon. Daphnis’ jealousy is now aroused, and he challenges Dorcon to a dancing contest, the prize to be a kiss from Chloé. Dorcon performs a grotesque dance, and is jeered by the onlookers. Daphnis easily wins Chloé’s kiss with his graceful performance. The crowd leads Chloé away, leaving Daphnis alone to lapse into languid ecstasy. Lycenion, a seductive young woman, steals upon Daphnis, and tries to excite his interest by letting slip several of her veils, but he remains indifferent. She withdraws. Daphnis’ attention is suddenly drawn to the clanging of arms and shouts of alarm from the woods. Pirates have invaded and set upon the Greeks. Daphnis rushes off to protect Chloé. In the melee, Chloé has returned to the altar of the Nymphs, but her prayers to them go unanswered, and she is captured. Daphnis returns to find her torn scarf. He curses the gods for having failed to protect his lover, and falls senseless at the entrance to the grotto. An otherworldly light envelops the scene as the Nymphs come to life. They descend from their pedestals, and, in a slow, mysterious dance before the large rock, supplicate for help from the god Pan, whose form emerges from the clouds as night falls. In Scene Two, set on a jagged seacoast, the brigands enter their hideaway laden with booty. They perform a barbaric war-dance before their chief, Bryaxis, and fall exhausted. Chloé, hands bound, is led in. Bryaxis attempts to woo her, and orders her to dance. She implores her abductors for pity in her dance, pleading for her release. When the chief refuses, the sky grows dark, and Pan, arm extended threateningly, appears upon the nearby mountains. The frightened pirates flee, leaving Chloé alone. Scene Three is again set amid the hills and meadows of the ballet’s first scene, where Daphnis is still prostrate. It is sunrise. Herdsmen arrive, and revive Daphnis with the news that Chloé has been rescued. She appears, and throws herself into Daphnis’ arms. The old shepherd Lammon explains to them that Pan has saved Chloé in remembrance of his love for the Nymph Syrinx. In gratitude, Daphnis and Chloé re-enact the ancient tale, in which Syrinx is transformed into a reed by her sisters to save her from the lustful pursuit of Pan, who then made a flute from that selfsame reed — the pipes of Pan — upon which to play away his longing. The dance grows more animated until Chloé abandons her role as Syrinx and falls into Daphnis’ arms. The two lovers approach the altar of the Nymphs. A group of maidens enters dressed as bacchantes, followed by a band of young men. Daphnis and Chloé embrace tenderly, and join in the general joyous tumult that ends the ballet. From the complete ballet, Ravel extracted two Suites comprising some two-thirds of the work’s length. The First Suite includes the Nocturne in which the vivified nymphs console Daphnis after Chloé’s abduction, the choral Interlude between Scenes One and Two, and the Warlike Dance of the Pirates. The Second Suite parallels the action of the ballet’s final Scene: Daybreak, Pantomime of the adventure of Pan and Syrinx, and the concluding General Dance. ©2017 Dr. Richard E. Rodda

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