Bach / Gounod: Ave Maria

Many people have walked in pomp and circumstance along the aisle, arm in arm with their future life partner. Their slow happy steps were perhaps marked by that most beautiful melody  known as Schubert's Ave Maria, one of the many Ave Marias composed by numerous authors over the years. It is the most popular for such occasions; no doubt, it was the one that many of us heard in our own wedding, whilst we bowed here and there to friends and relatives, with a radiant smile of happiness.

Half of an Ave Maria
However, an author unintentionally composed half of an Ave Maria; to be fair, more than one-half. It was 1772 and Johann Sebastian Bach was beginning his greatest pedagogical and systematic work for the keyboard, The Well-Tempered Clavier. The book includes 24 preludes and fugues for the twelve major keys and twelve minor ones. Of enormous significance, the work helped to impose the division of the octave in exactly twelve chromatic halftones, which allowed for the mechanism of modulations (the smooth transition from one key to another within the same piece), to develop to its limits.

The first prelude, in C major. A modest version performed on a digital keyboard:



Gounod's apparition
Many years later, during the 1850s, the author of the opera Faust, Charles Gounod, was enjoying his own interpretation of this prelude when suddenly his Muse delicately touched his shoulder suggesting to him a tune he immediately called, "Meditation on Bach’s Prelude No 1". Soon afterwards, the French composer realised that the words of the very old prayer called in Latin Ave Maria, fitted his beautiful melody perfectly.

This is what we know today as the Bach/Gounod Ave Maria. Although less popular, it is in my opinion as beautiful as the one written by Schubert, if not more.

The version presented here is for piano and cello (Yo-Yo-Ma, at the cello; Kathrin Stott, piano), which allows for a clear recognition of the prelude, and at the same time the appreciation of the obviously talented work of Gounod.

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Mozart: Violin Concerto No 3

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was 19 years old when he composed the five violin concertos. By the time, he was the first violin at the orchestra of his clumsy patron boss Colloredo, Prince-Archbishop of Salzburg. By the hand of his father, Wolfgang had long toured halfway around Europe playing the keyboard with Nannerl, his older sister. As a keyboard player, he had amazed half the world, but his abilities as a violinist were only known to those who had had the good fortune of listening to him in Salzburg or in some modest court in the surroundings.

His father Leopold, who knew more than a little about violins – he had written one of the first pedagogical treatises in the history of the instrument – once wrote to him: "... it happens that you are not aware of how well you play the violin". Much later, interestingly enough, he insisted: "If you had wanted, you could have been the best violinist in Europe." Leopold had not yet realized that Wolfgang was going to be the greatest composer of the classical period.

Colloredo
A year before he began the composition of the five concerts, Wolfgang had received a refusal from Colloredo to his request to go to Vienna. Mozart expected to make himself better known and fruitfully interact with other musicians in that city. In addition, he desired to escape, even if for a little while, from the unhappiness of serving His Eminence in a court he detested.

So it’s perfectly possible to imagine that the violin concertos were composed thinking of a forthcoming and definitive departure from the court of Salzburg. Their construction would work as a sort of consolidation of a repertoire to be presented before the most striking courts of Germany or France, where Wolfgang could also shine as a violinist, following the instructions of his father.

The Italian school
Nevertheless, Mozart composed the five violin concertos in record time, between April and December 1775. When comparing them to the piano concertos, it is customary to say that the violin concertos are more superficial. However, all of them reflects the unparalleled knowledge that Wolfgang had of the Italian school, with its melodic and graceful style. Certainly, they are a precious testimony of the refinement and gallant style that must have prevailed in the court of Salzburg more than two centuries ago. 

Concerto for violin and orchestra N° 3
Structured in the three traditional movements, fast, slow, fast, the concerto N° 3, in G major, is one of the most demanded by public and performers of our time.

The American violinist Hilary Hahn is the soloist, accompanied by the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Gustavo Dudamel. The performance took place in 2007 for the birthday of Pope Benedict XVI, in a modest Vatican’s room laboriously reconditioned for the occasion.

Movements:
00:00  Allegro - A prototype of a gallant ending, although it will be surpassed by the gallantry of the end of the third movement. (Cadenzas are from Hilary).
10:35  Adagio - Instead of the usual andante, Mozart incorporates an adagio that floats in a dreamy atmosphere.
21:00  Rondo - As usual, half jokingly and half seriously, Mozart said of this movement that "it could only have been written by a man of superior talent". No brilliant endings at all. At the end, the work seems to say goodbye, with supreme elegance, because it needs to take a break.

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Rossini: La gazza ladra - Overture

Gioacchino Rossini had been married to opera singer Isabel Colbrand for only a year when he was forced to revisit the old serious opera in the Rococo style since Colbrand only did sing serious operas. The result was Semiramide, in 1823, which had a cool reception. The next “real” opera –and the last one– would be Guillaume Tell, composed at age 37, in 1829. In the forty years remaining in his life, Rossini will never again compose a single opera.

Much has been speculated about the ultimate reason for this drastic and unprecedented decision in the life of a musician. At the peak of his fame and surrounded by the splendor of his glory, Rossini went silent and abandoned his craft forever.
It is true that the work demanded by the monumental opera Guillaume Tell was gigantic, becoming at times a task almost unbearable. So, it's not unlikely the maestro has decided to take a good break after the premiere.

Once settled in his villa on the outskirts of Paris in 1855, Rossini would only compose mainly small piano pieces to be given to his friends as presents. He would devote his time to enjoy every morning caring for the growing of the fruits of the earth, or trying his hands on delicacies arising from his other passion, gastronomy.
With affection and helpfullness, Olympe Pélissier, his new partner (Colbrand died in 1846), will take care of him admirably until the end of his days in 1868, without claiming, for her personal enjoyment, the composition of arias of any kind.

La Gazza Ladra - Overture
Many years before, in 1817, Rossini had released the opera in two acts La gazza ladra (The Thieving Magpie). The opera is rarely performed today, but its grand overture is a beloved concert favorite, taking part of films and advertising of any kind. By all means, it was a great success to join the soundtrack of A Clockwork Orange, by Kubrick, in 1971.

A resource with no precedents at that time, the famous Rossinian crescendo – the increasing intensity of the repetitions of a theme until it burst into an orchestral roar – is seen here in all its overwhelming magnitude. Unheard for that years, the work begins with a pair of side drum rolls at the very start. I warmly recommend listening to the overture at full volume.

A very young Claudio Abbado conducts the Berlin Philharmonic, on the occasion of the traditional New Year's concert.

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Beethoven's childhood — Sonata No 3

Beethoven's grandfather, called Louis, not Ludwig, is supposed to have settled in Bonn around 1730, after leaving the Netherlands. An acclaimed violinist, he had held in Bonn a position as a court musician, and later the post of maestro di capella. His earnings were scarce, and he tried his luck with a wine business. It was not a good idea. Only a little earlier Louis had married Maria-Josepha —a sweet and melancholic German woman, perhaps more melancholic than sweet— and she soon took to the bottle and years later died of alcoholism.

They had an only child, Johann, who inherited his father's musical gifts and his mother’s love for fine wines. In turn, Johann married the daughter of the Court’s cook, who he met when he was a tenor in the Choir of the Prince’s chapel.  Although Grandpa Louis had initially opposed the marriage, because of Maria Magdalene’s low social status, he became very fond of her as he witnessed her efforts to rectify his son’s disordered life.

Of all the children the couple had, only three boys reached adulthood. Ludwig was the oldest, and as such, he had the sad obligation to attend the local prison to identify his father among the other men detained for drunkenness. One should assume that Johann must not have spent all his time drinking; after all, he was able to recognize his child’s musical talent – not quite the precocious genius of Mozart but astonishing skilled in musical interpretation. Johann decided to lock him up every day in a room to practice his lessons, letting him off only when he could demonstrate a thorough mastering of the lessons.

Thus, Ludwig’s musical training was a duty rather than a desire, a torment rather than innate vocation or creative enthusiasm. Little by little, diligently, he would transform this obligation in an intimate, strictly personal retreat, the only place from where his creative genius could break free.

Sonata Op 2 No 3  —  Adagio
Thus, Ludwig’s musical training was a duty rather than a desire, a torment rather than innate vocation or creative enthusiasm. Little by little, diligently, he would transform this obligation in an intimate, strictly personal retreat, the only place from where his creative genius could break free.

If the Moonlight Sonata contains the annotation: "si deve sonnare tutto questo pezzo delicatissimamente", the profound and simple beauty of this adagio should command the listener to “ascoltare tutto questo pezzo delicatissimamente”.

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