Program notes by J. Mark Baker
FELIX MENDELSSOHN
Born 3 February 1809; Hamburg, Germany
Died 4 November 1847; Leipzig, Germany
The Hebrides Overture, Opus 26 (“Fingal’s Cave”)
Composed: 1829-33
First performance: 10 January 1833; Berlin, Germany
Last MSO performance: February 2019; Alexander Shelley, conductor
Instrumentation: 2 flutes; 2 oboes; 2 clarinets; 2 bassoons; 2 horns; 2 trumpets; timpani; strings
Approximate duration: 10 minutes
In the summer of 1829, the 20-year-old Felix Mendelssohn and his friend Karl Klingemann went on a walking tour of Scotland. They also traveled to the Hebrides Islands, off the country’s west coast, and later to Fingal’s Cave on the Island of Staffa. It is said that, after seeing the breathtaking scenery there, Mendelssohn composed the opening bars of his overture and sent them to his sister Fanny, writing, “In order to make you understand how extraordinarily the Hebrides affected me, I send you the following, which came into my head there.” The composer completed the overture’s first draft in Rome, late in 1830. Unhappy with this initial endeavor, he worked on the piece over the next few years. It was premiered in London in 1832, then further revised before its publication in 1833.
Set in sonata form, the overture does not tell a story, but rather evokes the sea and the scenery Mendelssohn encountered. The undulating rhythmic pattern, an arpeggiated fragment in B minor, depicts the sea’s ebb and flow. Dramatic crescendi and sforzandi represent the crashing waves. The second theme, set in D major, first appears in the cellos and bassoons. It is unfettered and more expansive, deemed “the greatest melody Mendelssohn ever wrote” by the ever-quotable Sir Donald Francis Tovey. At the end of our voyage, the clarinet offers a wistful statement of the opening motive, then defers to the flute, who has the last word with its ascending B minor arpeggio above hushed pizzicato strings.
TŌRU TAKEMITSU
Born 8 October 1930; Tokyo, Japan
Died 20 February 1996; Tokyo, Japan
Toward the Sea II (Umi e II)
Composed: 1981
First performance: 27 June 1982; Hokkaido, Japan
Last MSO performance: MSO premiere Instrumentation: strings
Approximate duration: 15 minutes
One of the most prolific composers of the second half of the 20th century, Tōru Takemitsu was the first Japanese composer fully recognized in the West. His impressive list of works includes over 180 concert pieces, 93 film scores, and several works for theater and dance. His early influences were Debussy, Webern, and Messiaen, but his later music reflects a preoccupation with tone color and an understated, crystalline sound. Precision is ever at the forefront, and silence is fully organized.
In the early 1980s, Takemitsu became increasingly absorbed with tonality – not the functional dominant-to-tonic sort of harmony that defines so much of Western music, but one more aqueous, as evidenced in Toward the Sea. Commissioned by the Greenpeace organization for their Save the Whales campaign, he once described it as “an homage to the sea which creates all things and a sketch for the sea of tonality.” Built on a three-note motif – E-flat, E, A – that translates to S-E-A in German parlance, the piece is divided into three sections, each of which references Herman Melville’s classic novel, Moby-Dick.
The work exists in several versions. Takemitsu originally scored the piece for alto flute and guitar, later arranging it for alto flute and marimba and alto flute and harp. The version we’ll hear on today’s concert is deliciously scored for alto flute, harp, and string orchestra. Debussy’s influence on the work is unmistakable. The composer has created an Impressionistic tone poem that simultaneously invokes a sense of quiet majesty and the great whales of the deep.
DAVID LUDWIG
Born 1974; Bucks County, Pennsylvania
Pictures from the Floating World
Composed: 2013
First performance: 1 November 2013; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Last MSO performance: MSO premiere
Instrumentation: 2 flutes (2nd doubling on piccolo); 2 oboes; 2 clarinets; 2 bassoons; 2 horns; 2 trumpets; tenor trombone; timpani; percussion (almglocken, bass drum, cymbals, medium gong, sizzle cymbal, tam tam, triangle, vibraphone, wood block); harp; strings
Approximate duration: 18 minutes
The American composer David Ludwig boasts an impressive musical heritage: his grandfather was the pianist Rudolph Serkin, and his great-grandfather was the violinist Adolf Busch. Having received numerous commissions and held positions with nearly two-dozen orchestras in the United States and abroad, he currently serves at the dean of music at The Juilliard School. His choral piece, The New Colossus,was performed at an official prayer service on the morning of Barack Obama’s 2013 presidential inauguration.
Pictures from the Floating World was commissioned by the Philadelphia Orchestra for conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin and for David Matsukawa, its principal bassoonist. In preliminary discussions, Matsukawa told Ludwig that bouncy pieces like The Sorcerer’s Apprentice (Dukas) had “done us in.” He desired a work that would show off the bassoon’s lyrical capabilities, likening it to the human voice – itself a wind instrument that has different timbres based on what part of the range is being utilized.
For Ludwig, the idea of cantabile lines led to the thoughts of water, which led to thoughts of floating, Japanese art, and Debussy – himself fascinated by the woodblock prints he saw at the World Exhibition in 1881. (Earlier on, Ludwig had intended to pursue an art history degree, but switched to composition.) He took as his point of departure five of Debussy’s “water music” pieces, casting the bassoon concerto into five continuous movements. Each flows unabatedly into the next:
• Submerged Cathedral
• Sirens (interlude for bassoon and two cellos)
• On the Boat
• Sails (interlude for bassoon and two cellos)
• Reflections in the Water
The soloist “sings” over the entire 20 minutes of the concerto, as the orchestra undergirds with
Debussy-influenced harmonies and timbres. “Going back to the idea of the ‘Floating World,’” the composer writes, “there is something poetic for me, as we in the modern world tend to float through our days as one passes into the next, losing definition into memory. (Debussy had an especially keen sense of this.) This piece is a journal, of sorts, to describe that feeling, gliding on time in a world of fleet impressions.”
HELEN GRIME
Born 1981; York, England
Virga
Composed: 2007
First performance: July 2007; London, England
Last MSO performance: MSO premiere
Instrumentation: 3 flutes (2nd and 3rd doubling on piccolo); 2 oboes; English horn; 2 clarinets; bass clarinet; 2 bassoons; contrabassoon; 4 horns; 3 trumpets; trombone; bass trombone; tuba; timpani; percussion (bass drum, crotale, cymbals, glockenspiel, marimba, suspended cymbals, tam tam, triangle, whip, wood block, xylophone); celeste; strings Approximate duration: 6 minutes
A Scottish composer born in England, Helen Grime’s catalogue of works includes concertos, orchestral music, piano works, vocal and choral music, an opera, and chamber and ensemble music. She studied at the Royal College of Music and, in 2008, was a Leonard Bernstein Fellow at Tanglewood. Currently, she is a professor of composition at London’s Royal Academy of Music. Virga was commissioned by the London Symphony Orchestra; it was named one of the best ten new classical works of the first decade of the 21st century by the Royal Scottish National Opera. Grime has offered the following insights into this brief but captivating work:
Virga opens with a striking gesture in woodwind and tuned percussion that is to become a recurring feature throughout the piece. In this fast-moving five-minute long piece, there is much rapid passagework in the strings, in particular a series of turbulent cascading runs, as well as a stately chorale in the brass. About half way through the piece, there is an extended melody for the first violins, at first unaccompanied and later colored by other sections of the orchestra. The extremes of register that were available to me in the orchestra are amplified and highlighted during the small time-scale and were essential in determining the shape of the piece.
CLAUDE DEBUSSY
Born 22 August 1862; Sainte-Germain-en-Laye, France
Died 25 March 1918; Paris, France
La mer
Composed: 1903-05
First performance: October 1905; Paris, France
Last MSO performance: June 2019; Matthias Pintscher, conductor Instrumentation: 2 flutes; piccolo; 2 oboes; English horn; 2 clarinets; 3 bassoons; contrabassoon; 4 horns; 3 trumpets; 2 cornets; 3 trombones; tuba; timpani; percussion (bass drum, cymbals, glockenspiel, tam tam, triangle); 2 harps; strings Approximate duration: 23 minutes
“We must agree that the beauty of a work of art will always remain a mystery. In other words, we can never be absolutely sure ‘how it’s made.’” These words by Debussy seem especially appropriate when considering his set of three “symphonic sketches,” La mer. Neither a “normal” symphony nor a complete disavowal of the form, it nevertheless is a brilliant opus in the orchestral repertoire. (The Russian pianist Sviatoslav Richter named it one his top three favorites, along with Bach’s St. Matthew Passion and Wagner’s Ring cycle.) These pieces are not programmatic in a traditional sense. That is, they don’t tell a story that follows a normal time line – though Debussy’s friend Eric Satie wryly quipped that, in “From Dawn to Noon on the Sea,” he “particularly liked the bit at a quarter to eleven.” In this work, “the story” is all about color, texture, and nuance.
In the opening segment, as the morning progresses, listen for the sometimes obvious, sometimes subtle, changes in lighting and atmosphere. In “Play of the Waves,” notice the shimmering surface of the water, feel the rocking of the waves and unexpected shifts of the current. In “Dialogue of the Wind and the Sea,” there’s a storm a-coming. The orchestra swells in great washes of sound as air and water collide. Ultimately, though, the sun breaks through the clouds. Calm is restored.
Bonjour! Make a great choice for your child’s education! Enroll now for K4/K5 and Gr. 1. Seats fill quickly for Fall 2022.
Bonjour! Make a great choice for your child’s education! Enroll now for K4/K5 and Gr. 1. Seats fill quickly for Fall 2022.
2023.
Milwaukee French Immersion School (MFIS) is one of the top schools in MPS — and the only school in the city to offer immersion in French. Students enter the immersion program in K4/K5 or Grade 1, and all instruction is in French. English reading and writing begins in Grade 2. Most other subjects are taught in French through Grade 5. Students become fluent in French with many continuing language immersion at Milwaukee School of Languages (Gr. 6–12).
Safe and Positive – Teachers and families work together!
Why French? French is the most frequently learned second language in the world, after English.
2023.
2023.
Milwaukee French Immersion School (MFIS) is one of the top schools in MPS — and the only school in the city to offer immersion in French. Students enter the immersion program in K4/K5 or Grade 1, and all instruction is in French. English reading and writing begins in Grade 2. Most other subjects are taught in French through Grade 5. Students become fluent in French with many continuing language immersion at Milwaukee School of Languages (Gr. 6–12).
Bonjour! Make a great choice for your child’s education! Enroll now for K4/K5 and Gr. 1. Seats fill quickly for Fall 2022. Milwaukee French Immersion School (MFIS) is one of the top schools in MPS — and the only school in the city to offer immersion in French. Students enter the immersion program in K4/K5 or Grade 1, and all instruction is in French. English reading and writing begins in Grade 2. Most other subjects are taught in French through Grade 5. Students become fluent in French with many continuing language immersion at Milwaukee School of Languages (Gr. 6–12).
5225 W. Vliet Street P.O. Box 2181 Milwaukee, WI 53201-2181
Safe and Positive – Teachers and families work together!
Safe and Positive – Teachers and families work together!
Internationally-recognized! MFIS has earned the prestigious LabelFrancEducation status for immersion excellence.
Why French? French is the most frequently learned second language in the world, after English.
Diverse! Many cultures comprise the school community.
Why French? French is the most frequently learned second language in the world, after English.
Internationally-recognized! MFIS has earned the prestigious LabelFrancEducation status for immersion excellence.
leadership, collaboration and instructional team.
transportation (1-mile walk zone), no tuition
Internationally-recognized! MFIS has earned the prestigious LabelFrancEducation status for immersion excellence.
and after-school camp with activities and homework
Diverse! Many cultures comprise the school community.
Diverse! Many cultures comprise the school community.
from 7 – 9:00 a.m. and 4 – 6:00 p.m.
leadership, collaboration and instructional team.
Great leadership, collaboration and instructional team.
874-8400 to schedule a tour and enroll.
transportation (1-mile walk zone), no tuition
transportation (1-mile walk zone), no tuition
Before- and after-school camp with activities and homework help from 7 – 9:00 a.m. and 4 – 6:00 p.m.
and after-school camp with activities and homework
Milwaukee French Immersion School
from 7 – 9:00 a.m. and 4 – 6:00 p.m.
St., Milwaukee, WI 53210 • mpsmke.com/mfis
(414) 874-8400 to schedule a tour and enroll.
a.m.
p.m. • 140@milwaukee.k12.wi.us
Milwaukee French Immersion School
]
]
]
]
]
]
]
Call
5225 P.O. Milwaukee, 2360 N. 52nd St., Milwaukee,
K4 – Gr. 5 • 9:00 a.m. –
MPS_MFIS_Mktg PostCards_8.5x5.5_1121 V2.indd 2 PostCards_8.5x5.5_1121 V2.indd 1 11/4/21 1:39 PM
Free
WI 53210 • mpsmke.com/mfis
4:00 p.m. • 140@milwaukee.k12.wi.us
]
]
]
]
]
]
help
Call
5225
2360
52nd
K4 – Gr. 5 • 9:00
–
MPS_MFIS_Mktg PostCards_8.5x5.5_1121 V2.indd 2 MPS_MFIS_Mktg PostCards_8.5x5.5_1121 V2.indd 1 11/4/21 1:39 PM
]
Great
Free
Before-
(414) 874-8400 to schedule a tour and enroll.
Milwaukee,
N.
St., Milwaukee, WI 53210 • mpsmke.com/mfis
a.m.
4:00 p.m. • 140@milwaukee.k12.wi.us
]
]
]
] Great
] Free
]
help
Call
]
Before-
(414)
2360 N. 52nd
K4 – Gr. 5 • 9:00
MPS_MFIS_Mktg PostCards_8.5x5.5_1121 V2.indd 2 MPS_MFIS_Mktg PostCards_8.5x5.5_1121 V2.indd 1 11/4/21 1:39 PM
– 4:00
KEN-DAVID MASUR
Music Director
Polly and Bill Van Dyke Music Director Chair
EDO DE WAART
Music Director Laureate
YANIV DINUR
Resident Conductor
CHERYL FRAZES HILL
Chorus Director
Margaret Hawkins Chorus Director Chair
TIMOTHY J. BENSON Assistant Chorus Director
FIRST VIOLINS
Ilana Setapen, Acting Concertmaster, Charles and Marie Caestecker Concertmaster Chair
Jeanyi Kim, Acting Associate Concertmaster (2nd Chair)
Alexander Ayers Yuka Kadota
Ji-Yeon Lee**
Dylana Leung Allison Lovera Lijia Phang Margot Schwartz Alexandra Switala**
SECOND VIOLINS
Jennifer Startt, Principal, Andrea and Woodrow Leung Second Violin Chair
Timothy Klabunde, Assistant Principal John Bian, Assistant Principal (3rd Chair)
Glenn Asch
Lisa Johnson Fuller
Paul Hauer Hyewon Kim Shengnan Li* Laurie Shawger
Mary Terranova
VIOLAS
Robert Levine, Principal, Richard O. and Judith A. Wagner Family Principal Viola Chair
Samantha Rodriguez, Acting Assistant Principal, Friends of Janet F. Ruggeri Viola Chair
Alejandro Duque, Acting Assistant Principal (3rd Chair)
Elizabeth Breslin
Nathan Hackett
Erin H. Pipal Helen Reich
CELLOS
Susan Babini, Principal, Dorothea C. Mayer Cello Chair
Nicholas Mariscal, Assistant Principal
Scott Tisdel, Associate Principal Emeritus Madeleine Kabat
Peter Szczepanek Peter J. Thomas Adrien Zitoun
BASSES
Jon McCullough-Benner, Principal, Donald B. Abert Bass Chair
Andrew Raciti, Associate Principal Nash Tomey, Assistant Principal (3rd Chair) Brittany Conrad Peter Hatch Paris Myers
HARP
Julia Coronelli, Principal, Walter Schroeder Harp Chair
FLUTES
Sonora Slocum, Principal, Margaret and Roy Butter Flute Chair
Heather Zinninger, Assistant Principal Jennifer Bouton Schaub
PICCOLO
Jennifer Bouton Schaub
OBOES
Katherine Young Steele, Principal, Milwaukee Symphony League Oboe Chair
Kevin Pearl, Assistant Principal Margaret Butler
ENGLISH HORN
Margaret Butler, Philip and Beatrice Blank English Horn Chair in memoriam to John Martin
CLARINETS
Todd Levy, Principal, Franklyn Esenberg Clarinet Chair Benjamin Adler, Assistant Principal, Donald and Ruth P. Taylor Assistant Principal Clarinet Chair
Taylor Eiffert
E FLAT CLARINET
Benjamin Adler
BASS CLARINET
Taylor Eiffert
BASSOONS
Catherine Van Handel, Principal, Muriel C. and John D. Silbar Family Bassoon Chair
Rudi Heinrich, Assistant Principal Beth W. Giacobassi
CONTRABASSOON
Beth W. Giacobassi
HORNS
Matthew Annin, Principal, Krause Family French Horn Chair
Krystof Pipal, Associate Principal Dietrich Hemann, Andy Nunemaker French Horn Chair Darcy Hamlin Kelsey Williams**
TRUMPETS
Matthew Ernst, Principal, Walter L. Robb Family Trumpet Chair
David Cohen, Associate Principal, Martin J. Krebs Associate Principal Trumpet Chair Alan Campbell, Fred Fuller Trumpet Chair
TROMBONES
Megumi Kanda, Principal, Marjorie Tiefenthaler Trombone Chair Kirk Ferguson, Assistant Principal
BASS TROMBONE
John Thevenet, Richard M. Kimball Bass Trombone Chair
TUBA Robyn Black, Principal TIMPANI Dean Borghesani, Principal Chris Riggs, Assistant Principal
PERCUSSION
Robert Klieger, Principal Chris Riggs
PIANO Melitta S. Pick Endowed Piano Chair
PERSONNEL MANAGERS
Françoise Moquin, Director of Orchestra Personnel Constance Aguocha, Assistant Personnel Manager
LIBRARIAN
Paul Beck, Principal Librarian, Anonymous Donor, Principal Librarian Chair
PRODUCTION
Tristan Wallace, Technical Manager & Live Audio Supervisor Paolo Scarabel, Stage Technician & Deck Supervisor
* Leave of Absence 2022.23 Season
** Acting member of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra 2022.23 Season
2022.23 SEASON