Boris Berman, piano, November 6, 2019

horowitz piano series Boris Berman, artistic director

Boris Berman

Wednesday, November 6, 2019 | 7:30 pm Morse Recital Hall in Sprague Memorial Hall

Robert Blocker, Dean

Program Franz Schubert 1797–1828

Piano Sonata No. 20 in A major, D. 959 I. Allegro II. Andantino III. Scherzo. Allegro vivace IV. Rondo. Allegretto

intermission

Frédéric Chopin 1810–1849

Barcarolle in F-sharp major, Op. 60

Mazurkas, Op. 30 No. 1 in C minor. Allegretto non tanto No. 2 in B minor. Allegretto No. 3 in D-flat major. Allegro non troppo No. 4 in C-sharp minor. Allegretto

Nocturnes, Op. 27 No. 1 in C-sharp minor. Larghetto No. 2 in D-flat major. Lento sostenuto

Mazurkas, Op. 33 No. 1 in G-sharp minor. Mesto No. 2 in C major. Semplice No. 3 in D major. Vivace No. 4 in B minor. Mesto

Polonaise–Fantaisie in A-flat major, Op. 61

As a courtesy to others, please silence all devices. Photography and recording of any kind is strictly prohibited. Please do not leave the hall during musical selections. Thank you.

Artist Profile Boris Berman, piano Boris Berman has performed in more than fifty countries on six continents with leading orchestras, on major recital series, and at important festivals. Born in Moscow, he studied at Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory with Lev Oborin. In 1973, he left a flourishing career in the Soviet Union to immigrate to Israel.

Berman is Professor of Piano and Coordinator of the Piano Department at the Yale School of Music and conducts master classes throughout the world. He has been named an Honorary Professor of the Shanghai Conservatory of Music, the Royal Danish Academy of Music in Copenhagen, and the China Conservatory of Music in Beijing.

He is frequently invited to join the juries of international competitions.

A Grammy nominee, Berman has recorded all the solo piano works of Prokofiev and Schnittke, the complete sonatas of Scriabin, and works by Mozart, Weber, Schumann, Brahms, Franck, Shostakovich, Debussy, Cage, Berio, and Joplin.

Berman is the author of two books, Notes from the Pianist’s Bench and Prokofiev’s Piano Sonatas: A Guide for the Listener and the Performer, and is an editor of Shanghai Music Publishing House’s critical edition of Prokofiev’s Piano Sonatas. » borisberman.com

Horowitz Piano Series 2019–2020 Season DEC 11

Boris Slutsky Faculty pianist Boris Slutsky performs an all-Schumann program featuring the Arabeske, Op. 18, Kreisleriana, Op. 16, and the Symphonic Etudes, Op. 13 (including posthumously published variations).

JAN 22

Melvin Chen A performance of Janaček’s In the Mists, Six Etudes and a Dream by faculty composer Hannah Lash, and Shostakovich’s infrequently performed Piano Sonata No. 2 in B minor, Op. 61.

FEB 12 7 pm

Hung-Kuan Chen Faculty pianist Hung-Kuan Chen pays tribute to Beethoven with a performance of the composer’s last six sonatas.

mar 4

Lucille Chung and Alessio Bax A performance of Stravinsky’s piano four-hands arrangement of Petrushka, Ravel’s piano fourhands arrangement of Debussy’s Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun, and music by Lutoslawski and Poulenc.

Mar 25

Wei-Yi Yang A program that in part follows Chopin’s musical language into the works of Debussy and Scriabin.

Program Notes

by Patrick Campbell Jankowski Piano Sonata No. 20 schubert Call it “autumnal.” Yes, it was written in the last year of the Schubert’s life and published posthumously, but beyond autobiography, autumn seeps into the music itself: warmth and chill, melodies which fade away, and a sense of looking back and forward simultaneously. An air of nobility shades the initial gestures of the first movement, with its rich chords and percussive bass. It soon meanders into more florid, tender material with cascades of triplets, and the interplay between these two identities remains intact throughout the movement. A robust allegro theme wanders between major and minor, halts and restarts, and rarely seems to find a decisive conclusion. The nobility of the opening scarcely dominates, only emerging on occasion and acting almost as a temporary mask. By the coda, it is a pale ghost of an idea, and the movement ends on a whispering note, leading elegantly into the subsequent Andantino. Here is the emotional core of the sonata: balancing melancholic fragility against tumultuous and at times explosive drama. Schubert juxtaposes extreme dynamics and accents to create unpredictability which plays against the delicate, lullabylike opening theme. The bright, dancing Scherzo shines with bell-like sonorities, while in its pastoral trio, playful plucks in the “bass” and a chordal theme recall the very opening of the whole sonata, and some stormier moments seem to reflect upon the impassioned central section of the Andantino. Schubert unifies the whole sonata with remembrances and transformed echoes of prior material. If you hear something faintly familiar return in another

guise, you aren’t imagining things. It is, in part, what makes this work and its two companions (the ‘late sonatas’) so intriguing. The closing Rondo, like the first movement, begins in a noble air, now with unhurried calm. From this place, however, Schubert meanders to even greater extremes of thematic and dynamic contrast, as though the Andantino and Scherzo stretched boundaries in the interim. The movement ends, following a passage in which the theme seems to periodically run out of breath, with a look back to the place where we started, on the other side of a transformation.

Barcarolle chopin With Chopin’s music, things are often not what they seem. On its surface, this piece recalls the Venetian gondolier’s song to which its title alludes. The subtle swing and lilt and rolling rhythmic patterns are there, reminding us of the rock of a boat on a flowing canal. The theme atop the repeatedly undulating rhythmic patterns is vocal in quality, as though it could be sung by an oarsman. He marks the theme cantabile, or “sung.” Chopin harmonizes the theme in thirds, adding not only charm but a hint of ambiguity... is this a duet, perhaps, or the result of slight sonic distortion from a voice echoing off buildings and tunnels? There is no need to take things so literally, but this is but one manner in which Chopin flexes the notion of a tradition, toys with inspiration, and manipulates the vaguely familiar.

In a contrasting second section, the “rocking” motive dissolves into a sinuous single line,

which gives way to a tender, whisper-soft melody, which then grows to an impassioned, uninhibited state. The “barcarolle” melody does return eventually, but now varied – more untethered and even a bit unburdened. It emerges from one of the most magical transitions you might imagine: a much-discussed passage marked “dolce sfogato,” in which faint wisps of light and air seem to float from the keyboard. As with a sfogato soprano singer, the music is marked by fluidity and effervescence – an otherworldly moment in which we might all together forget about any boat songs.

That may well be the point.

Mazurkas chopin The mazurka, of which Chopin wrote many, become one of his signature forms. Its very presence and certainly its popularity in France and elsewhere outside of the composer’s native Poland are owed to his contributions. Hefty accents on “off-beats” within a meter of three are a characteristic feature, as are a general air of melodic simplicity and free fluctuations of tempo.

The melodies themselves are based around the Polish folk music language. While not direct quotations of folk tunes, his use of modalities and scales common to Poland (and decidedly less common in Western European music), allowed his audiences in the west a glimpse of what we would eventually call “Nationalism.” Though his mazurkas are connected formally, each is unique in its character and mood. Some are slower and seductive, churning along with rustic open fifths evoking a hand organ, with repetitive motives that get

stuck on loop. Some are more bold, with dramatic contrasts between weighty and weightless gestures. Others, like the D major from Opus 33, are propelled energetically with carefree joy. Its calmer sibling, the C major, is almost toy-like in its fragility and charm. In these dances, we encounter a broad spectrum of emotions and styles.

Chopin infuses these all into a dance that remained an artistic tether to his birthplace, even after he resettled in France. His heart remains, literally, inside of an urn in Warsaw, and Poland will likely always claim their native son.

Nocturnes chopin The multiplicity of human emotions and mental states is a common theme in Romantic art, and emerges in unexpected places, even in purely abstract works. The Opus 27 Nocturnes are fine pieces on their own – each a pristine example of the nocturne form as rendered by Chopin – but when joined together, they take on an irresistable doppelgänger dynamic. The pair are enharmonically linked, meaning that they share they same tonal center, while one stretches from its core into the minor mode, and the other into the major.

Beyond that, they each display the common features of the nocturne: a mostly simple and unobtrusive accompaniment, evoking a plucked guitar or lute; a free and expansive melodic line atop the accompaniment; a contrasting middle section and a “return” to the opening theme. It is how they differ that holds real interest.

Program Notes, cont.

The first begins ominously, with a murky bass murmur in the accompanying strum.

Half-steps sneak into the melodic line as it slides between minor and major harmonies.

From a gentle whisper, the dynamic builds to an intense high. The strumming becomes more active, and the melody unfolds into a moment of joy at its core. It almost appears for a time to take on the spirit of a folk dance. Chopin dissolves everything away, leaving an austere plunge to the depths of the piano. The opening theme returns, yet adopts a note of tenderness in its final breaths, including a chordal “Amen.”

Polonaise-Fantaisie chopin In this reimagined echo of a polonaise, we are reminded of Chopin’s gifts as a craftsman of melody and dance, and a brilliant, immediate, seemingly spontaneous inventor. While much of this music may well be very controlled and carefully planned, it never feels calculated. Instead, Chopin creates a fantasy on the idea of polonaise: the distinct, hefty triple-meter dance acting as his inspiration and not his limitation.

Gently cascading arcs, somber nocturnal melodies, and arpeggios that float upward like billows of smoke. Impassioned, stormy passages atop churning trills in the bass.

None of these sound particularly Polonaiselike. The dance sneaks into the piece, sometimes obviously but more often subtly, like a thought that you can’t seem to remove entirely from your mind but which is often overshadowed by the significance of “now.”

The immediacy and improvisational nature of the piece, with its multitude of contrasting sections and variations, forces us to be

present when listening to it, though we often aren’t sure where we are going or even what we are listening to. Chopin himself wasn’t sure what to call it, so we aren’t alone in our cloud of ambiguity. “I’d like to finish something that I don’t yet know what to call,” he noted. The title eventually came, but don’t overthink it.

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Upcoming Events Bernarda Fink, mezzo-soprano with pianist Anthony Spiri YSM Special Events “A master of the disarming, deceptive simplicity of the song recital.” – The New York Times Songs by Schubert, Dvořák, Hugo Wolf, Joaquin Rodrigo, and Carlos Guastavino.

7:30 p.m. | Morse Recital Hall

Tickets start at $12, students $5 nov 8

nov 12 Polonsky-Shifrin-Wiley Trio

Oneppo Chamber Music Series Beethoven’s “Gassenhauer” Trio, Poulenc’s Trio, Brahms’ Clarinet Trio, and Nino Rota’s Trio for clarinet, cello, and piano.

7:30 pm | Morse Recital Hall

Tickets start at $28, students $13 nov 15 Ettore Causa & Boris Berman

Faculty Artist Series Violist Ettore Causa and pianist Boris Berman perform Shostakovich’s Viola Sonata, Chopin’s Cello Sonata (arranged for viola), and more.

7:30 pm | Morse Recital Hall

free

nov 15 Louis Hayes

Ellington Jazz Series “Throughout his career he’s solidified a place as one of jazz’s most soulfully swinging drummers.” – JazzTimes 7:30 pm | Morse Recital Hall

Tickets start at $22, students $10 nov 21 Peter Oundjian,

principal conductor

Yale Philharmonia Nighttime is celebrated in a program featuring Debussy’s Nocturnes with the treble voices of the Yale Schola Cantorum, Weber’s Bassoon Concerto, and Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade.

7:30 pm | Woolsey Hall Tickets start at $12, Yale faculty/ staff $8, students free* $3 surcharge at the door Horszowski Trio Oneppo Chamber Music Series Dvořák’s “Dumky” Trio, Carter’s Epigrams, and Shostakovich’s Piano Trio No. 2 in E minor.

7:30 pm | Morse Recital Hall

Tickets start at $28, students $13 dec 3

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