Leeds International Chamber Season 2017/18 Curated by The Gould Piano Trio
Tuesdays at 7.30pm
The Venue Quarry Hill, Leeds
One hardly needs an excuse to programme such sumptuous and compelling works as these large scale Russian Masterpieces, but in the centenary year of the Russian Revolution we have the opportunity to hear the more familiar alongside some less frequently performed pieces. In this series we look both ways, back towards Glinka and Tchaikovsky and forwards to Shostakovich and Stravinsky. We hear some compositions born from the Friday night meetings ‘Les Vendredis’ in St Petersburg and we have a concert of Debussy and Stravinsky – two decades apart in age but connected by their admiration for each other. Later in the season a rarely heard arrangement of the Rimsky-Korsakov Scheherazade for clarinet and piano trio, no less exciting for its fewer performers, will certainly shed new light on the piece. The elegiac trio, a thread running through the series, was taken up by many of the great Russian composers spanning some fifty years. Where would the trio repertoire be without these giants?! We look forward to welcoming our guests, the Navarra String Quartet, Peter Donohoe, Peter Hill, Ilona Domnich, Robert Plane and David Adams and to giving you, our audience, a taste of some colourful and epic adventures. Lucy Gould, Alice Neary, Benjamin Frith The Gould Piano Trio Artistic Directors Free pre-concert talk Tue 24 October 6.45pm, The Venue Join the Gould Piano Trio before the opening concert for an insight into this season’s theme.
ROBERT PLANE
24 October 2017
28 November 2017
12 December 2017
Gould Piano Trio
Navarra String Quartet
Lucy Gould violin Robert Plane clarinet Benjamin Frith piano Peter Hill piano
LUCY GOULD violin ALICE NEARY cello BENJAMIN FRITH piano Saint-Saëns Piano Trio No 2 Tchaikovsky Piano Trio (In memory of a Great Artist) During the 1870s, on one of SaintSaëns’ many foreign trips, he became acquainted with Tchaikovsky on a visit to Moscow. They became friends based primarily on the discovery of many composers they equally admired, particularly of the classical masters, and they remained in touch for many years until Tchaikovsky’s death. The trios being performed in this concert were written ten years apart and one immediately hears the inspiration behind the first movement of Saint-Saëns’ second trio. The first six notes of the melody are identical to those of the Tchaikovsky. Both of these trios are large scale, serious works and though deeply individual contain many references to the composers whom they so revered. Though not an elegiac work as such, you can certainly hear a tragic undercurrent in Saint-Saëns’ work. His unsuccessful attempt at family life led to two infant deaths followed by an estrangement from his wife, though perhaps his maturity at the time of writing this second trio is also a factor in the seriousness of the piece compared to so many of his lighter works. As for Tchaikovsky’s trio, you could hardly find a more potent outpouring of his grief at the death of his great friend Nikolai Rubinstein than in this giant of a piece. We hope you find these pieces complement each other in ways we will all discover during this concert as this will be the first time we have programmed these works together.
with DAVID ADAMS viola ALICE NEARY cello Arensky String Quartet No 2 Various Movements for String Quartet Les Vendredis Tchaikovsky Souvenir de Florence arr for String Sextet In this concert we hear music from the two centres of musical life in Russia during the 19th century. Moscow was the more provincial city and Tchaikovsky’s home, whilst St Petersburg was the cultural centre of Russian life at this time. Between 1885 and 1908 a group of composers, the ‘Belyayev circle’ met to perform chamber music in an informal setting. Works by the old masters, Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven were heard alongside something new written specifically for that evening. To gain entry to this circle one must have trained at the St Petersburg Conservatory, impressed RimskyKorsakov, and then receive an invitation to Belyayev’s house. Composers such as Borodin, Glazunov and Lyadov hoped their compositions would end up here. Arensky on the other hand decided to follow his own path. After studying with Rimsky-Korsakov in St Petersburg he returned to take up a post at the Moscow Conservatory. There he met Tchaikovsky, to whom this second string quartet is dedicated. Alice Neary joins the Navarra in this piece and David Adams completes the team for the much more frequently performed Souvenir de Florence. One of Tchaikovsky’s sunnier works, it nonetheless caused the composer a considerable headache trying to escape from the string quartet form. After its revision two years after completion he finally remarked “At the moment, I’m terribly pleased with myself.”
Stravinsky A Soldier’s Tale Debussy Violin Sonata Stravinsky Three Pieces Debussy Premier Rhapsody Debussy Jeux Stravinsky The Rite of Spring Debussy deeply admired Stravinsky’s early Russian ballet scores. This programme fully displays Stravinsky’s Russian style in his own arrangement of The Rite of Spring for piano duet, but even by the composition of his Soldier’s Tale in 1918 and the Three Pieces for Clarinet of the following year, a more post-Russian Revolutionary cosmopolitan style is emerging, influenced by jazz idioms, and who better to clarify these new traits in all their diversity than clarinet virtuoso, Robert Plane, principal clarinet of BBC National Orchestra of Wales. Stravinsky admired the senior Debussy’s unfailing creative powers, even during his final illness, and of course his incredible courage in forging new paths; however in the Sonata for violin and piano, one of Debussy’s last works, an older cast is employed to discover an even more intimate expression. The ballet, Jeux was originally performed by the Ballets Russes in 1913, but was unfortunately eclipsed by the scandalous success of the Rite. In another piano four-hand arrangement by its composer we can appreciate the finesse of Debussy’s score to the full. We are delighted to welcome the renowned Stravinsky and French music expert, Peter Hill to share in the performance of these two works, written at the piano by wonderful pianists!
PETER DONOHOE © Sussie-Ahlburg
ILONA DOMNICH
23 January 2018
13 February 2018
6 March 2018
Gould Piano Trio
Navarra String Quartet
Gould Piano Trio
with ROBERT PLANE clarinet Glinka Trio Pathétique Arensky Piano Trio No 1 Rimsky-Korsakov Scheherazade (arr for Clarinet Quartet) Drama of an almost operatic nature frames this programme. Glinka, primarily known for being the ‘Father of Russian Music’, was greatly influenced by his love of the Italian operas of Rossini and Bellini. He composed his Trio Pathétique in 1832 following a failed love affair, and pours the melodrama of his predicament into the music noting in the score “The only way I know love is by the pain it causes”. One of the ‘Russian Five’ who followed Glinka’s nationalistic path, RimskyKorsakov wrote his epic symphonic poem Scheherazade in 1888. Based on the tale of One Thousand and One Nights, it is made famous by its dramatic story telling, for its eastern leanings and tremendous orchestral colour. In this chamber version for piano trio and clarinet, the intimacy of the story is brought to the fore. If Glinka and Rimsky-Korsakov followed the more nationalistic path, filling their music with Russian village songs, Arensky was inspired by the heritage of Tchaikovsky. Indeed it was Tchaikovsky’s great elegiac trio of 1882 that motivated Arensky to write his first trio, dedicated to the memory of his friend, the cellist Carl Davidoff. Filled with the best of melodies, an impish scherzo, it is in the third movement, Elegia that we find the full pathos of this heartfelt work.
with PETER DONOHOE piano Shostakovich String Quartet No 5 Tchaikovsky String Quartet No 1 Taneyev Piano Quintet This concert features perhaps the least and the best-known works in our series. Tchaikovsky’s first piece of chamber music, the first string quartet, includes one of his most famous movements, Andante cantabile. On hearing the incredibly moving melody for the first time, Tolstoy is said to have burst into tears. In contrast, Taneyev’s piano quintet is most definitely unjustly neglected. Composed in 1911, it has the scale of a symphony and demands great virtuosity from all the performers. We are delighted to welcome Peter Donohoe and the Navarra Quartet to take on the challenge! Known as the ‘Russian Brahms’, Taneyev was best known in his lifetime as a pianist (premiering Tchaikovsky’s second piano concerto and piano trio) and teacher – his pupils included Rachmaninov. As a composer, Taneyev took inspiration from Germany rather than from the nationalism which his contemporaries, the ‘Russian Five’ adopted. Form, counterpoint and development of melody were paramount, with the atmosphere of Russian folk dance rather than any direct quotations. The third movement of the quintet is an intricately constructed passacaglia, which Shostakovich must certainly have studied, as he went on to pen many examples of this genre. And it is Shostakovich’s fifth string quartet which opens this concert. Written in 1952 it was premiered in Leningrad by the Beethoven Quartet to whom it is dedicated.
with ILONA DOMNICH soprano Shostakovich Seven Romances on Poems of Alexander Blok Shostakovich Piano Trio No 2 Rachmaninov Trio élégiaque No 2 Unlike Rachmaninov, who fled his native land for eternal exile, Shostakovich famously took the strain, just surviving under a system that deeply criticised any music it deemed anti-Soviet. Ironically, the Second World War brought a common enemy, somewhat relieving the pressure on him; he produced many of his most iconic works at this time. His second trio, with references to the countless Jewish victims in its finale, is such a piece, depicting all the sufferings and wildness of those turbulent years, but ending as it begins, in a kind of ethereal yearning. To begin however, the Russian soprano, Ilona Domnich, will sing the Seven Romances with piano trio from 1967 that were dedicated to the great Galina Vishnevskaya, who gave the premiere with her husband Mstislav Rostropovich playing the cello part. The pessimistic symbolist verses of Alexander Blok are communicated in a strikingly economical manner; not here is Shostakovich’s meaning at all ambiguous – it hits home decisively. Perhaps it is quite fitting that we close our series with Rachmaninov’s Trio élégiaque Op 9, the composer remarked, “after the trio there must be nothing else, because it is so long and grave”(!). Such was his idolisation of Tchaikovsky, that on hearing of his death in 1893; Rachmaninov plunged into the composition of this piece, modelling it on his hero’s recent trio in memory of Nikolai Rubinstein. The responsibility he felt must have been enormous; he “trembled for every phrase, sometimes crossed out absolutely everything...”
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There is a lift at the front of the building to The Venue and disabled toilets in the foyer area. Patrons with disabilities and their essential carers may obtain two tickets for the price of one – via the LICS Essential Carer Scheme – details from the Box Office 0113 376 0318. Support dogs are welcome. Please let us know when booking of any special access requirements you may have.
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The Venue
Quarry Hill, Leeds, LS2 7PD
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