Dittersdorf: Concerto for harp and strings

A famed composer in his time, on a par with Haydn or Mozart, the German Karl Ditters von Dittersdorf never wrote a harp concerto. But he did write five keyboard concertos. To the good fortune of hundreds of harp players worldwide, he took one of these concertos and transcribed it for harp. To this day, they thank him for it. It is their favorite. Certainly, because concertos for the instrument are not very common. Mozart made incursions into them, but with the flute sharing the leading role. There are known transcriptions of Haendel's organ works. For solo harp, stand out one by the French Boieldieu, another by Castelnuovo-Tedesco, and another by Villa-Lobos. One per musician. And Dittersdorf was the pioneer – through transcription – in the 18th century. 

 
Karl Ditters von Dittersdorf was born in Vienna in 1739, when Haydn was seven years old. By birth, he was tersely named Karl Ditters, but the twists and turns of life earned him a well-deserved title. He began his career as a violin virtuoso, and in that capacity, he strolled (that's putting it mildly) through the courts of half of Europe. In some, he served as chapel master, but unlike his contemporary Haydn, he never succeeded in gaining regular patronage in a showy court.
However, one of his lowly patrons, who once feared his departure, had to charm him with honors and titles to keep him. Thus, in 1772 Ditters became a nobleman and added the appendix "von Dittersdorf" to his surname. Despite this, he would die in poverty twenty-seven years later.

 Karl Ditters von Dittersdorf
(1739 - 1799)

A prolific composer
Dittersdorf was a prolific author of chamber music, symphonies (more than 120), and concertos, to which he added no less than 32 operas. His most creative period seems to be the one he spent with the patron prodigal in honors, to the point that he was close to entering the court of Joseph II as chapel master (hence the fears). 
In the mid-eighties (in the seventeen hundreds, of course) several of his numerous compositions became known in the most prestigious circles. In 1786 his greatest operatic success was premiered in Vienna, the singspiel "The Pharmacist and the Doctor", which was soon performed on stages all over Europe. He spent his last years writing his autobiography.

Concerto for harp and strings, in A major
The date of composition of the original keyboard concerto, the one that was transcribed for harp, is completely unknown. Even less is known about the transcription. We only know that the idea was brilliant if we remember that pianos contain in their interior a large piece that houses all their strings. That piece is called "harp". The transcription made perfect sense. One could only expect an increase in the flow of musicality, given the halo of lyricism and dreaminess that surrounds the instrument.

Movements:
In the "Vivaldian" style, a central, slow movement, is flanked by two more lively movements.

00:00  Allegro
07:22  Larghetto
16:35  Rondo - allegretto

The performance is by Spanish harpist Rosa Díaz Cotán, accompanied by the Neubrandenburger Philharmonie, conducted by the Russian conductor Daniel Stratiesvsky.

Mozart, "Dissonance Quartet", in C major

"... Mr. Joseph Haydn and the two Barons Tinti visited us on Saturday. We heard the new quartets, but only the three most recent ones, the ones he composed in addition to the other three we already have; they are indeed a little 'easier,' or 'lighter,' but splendidly composed. Mr. Haydn told me: 'I tell you before God, and give you my word of honor, that your son is the greatest composer I have ever known, personally, or in name. He has a taste and a great talent for composition...".

With these words, Leopold Mozart, visiting Vienna, related to his daughter Nannerl in February 1785 the impression that Wolfgang's last three quartets made on Haydn. Together with the three previous ones mentioned by Leopold, Mozart sent them to Haydn on September 1, 1785, offered to him in an affectionate letter in which he transferred to him "all my rights to them".

Known today as the "Haydn quartets", they were composed between 1782, the year of Mozart's arrival in Vienna, and 1785.
The Quartet in C major, popularly called "dissonance quartet", is the last of the series, completed on January 14 of the latter year and, according to Leopold, one of those heard at the evening in Haydn's presence.

Dissonance?
The moniker refers to the opening passages of the first movement and, as usual when it comes to nicknames, has nothing to do with Mozart. Nor does it have anything to do with a harmonic occurrence capable of shattering the listener's ears. The "dissonance" is heard in the first bars of the opening movement and consists of a chord progression over a "pedal note" carried by the cello. It may not have been a popular device at the time but it fully complies with the rules of eighteenth-century harmony.

Haydn's approach
But it is also said that it caused more than one tantrum in one or another distinguished aristocrat, which led him to tear the score into a thousand pieces. Also, some respectable performers returned the work to the publisher with corrections in their own handwriting. However, the very dedicatee of the six quartets, Joseph Haydn, discreetly pointed out that if that was how Mozart had written it, that was how it should be.

What Mozart sets out is simply to create a deliberate sense of ambiguity. He keeps us in the fog, in the dark, the misty, for the first few bars until the familiar C major chord appears, and the soul returns to our bodies.

Quartet No. 19 in C major, K 465, "Dissonance" - Movements
As usual for a string quartet, its movements are four, with two calm movements framed by two allegros.

00:00  Adagio - Allegro
10:00  Andante cantabile
17:30  Menuetto - Allegretto
22:44  Allegro molto

Enrique Granados, "Valses poéticos"

"Youth everywhere is at home," wrote Enrique Granados in his Memoirs, little read but curiously, much quoted. Those were his first days in Paris. He had got lost and a parishioner took him home. The young Catalan pianist, nineteen years old, thus began, in September 1887, his brief but very profitable two-year stay in Paris. A very untimely illness deprived him of entering the Conservatory, but he studied privately with renowned Parisian pianists and music teachers. From those years are his acclaimed "Valses Poéticos" for piano, the first of his mature works.

A generous Spanish patron had brought about the miracle. A year earlier, after his father's death, Granados had found himself in need of a job as a café pianist in Barcelona. For one hundred pesetas a month, the young musician played from "two to four-thirty in the afternoon and nine to eleven-thirty at night" at the Café de las Delicias, later known as "Lion d'Or". But the café, already somewhat outdated, went from bad to worse and the pianist's position was eliminated.

Enrique Granados (11867 - 1916)

Paris and back to Barcelona
It was at that moment that the renowned businessman Eduardo Conde entered the scene, and hired Granados as his children's teacher for a generous salary, making him "the most expensive teacher in Barcelona".  Shortly thereafter, he convinced his mother that the young man should pursue studies in Paris. Two years later, Granados was back in Barcelona, having met the most representative French composers of the time, and consolidating his friendship with his compatriot Isaac Albéniz.

"Poetic waltzes", for piano

Even with what has already been pointed out, there are authors who cite its genesis in a period prior to the author's trip to Paris, when he was seventeen or eighteen years old. In any case, it is a series of seven elegant waltzes, preluded by an introduction, in four-quarter time, and closing with a colorful and ingenious coda that, surprisingly, leads to the literal and complete repetition of the first waltz.

00:00  Introducción

01:32  Melódico

03:25  Tiempo de vals noble

04:50  Tiempo de vals lento

07:02  Allegro humorístico

07:50  Allegretto (Elegante)

09:22  Quasi ad libitum (Sentimental)

11:00  Vivo - Presto

The rendition is by Spanish pianist Luis Fernando Perez. (The video includes information about Goyescas, which we assume the performer played before the Waltzes, data that the videos forgot to remove).

Charles Ives: "Central Park in the Dark", for orchestra

 
Charles Ives, a successful insurance agent, church organist, and composer in his spare time, was first taught by his father, a restless U.S. Army bandleader. Charles was barely ten years old when his father encouraged his interest in modern harmonies and polytonality. Anyone would think that being exposed to such experiences, little Charlie would have run away from music, terrified. Fortunately, this was not the case, and it was not long before the child was able to accompany his father in a bitonal duet. The father would sing a melody in a certain key and Charles, a future composer, would manage to sing the same melody in a different key. It became clear that Charles Ives would not follow a traditional path.

Author of symphonies, string quartets, and piano sonatas, as well as an insurance executive, the composer used to write during the commuter trains that took him to his offices in New York, without caring much about what the world thought of his music, clearly one of a difficult language. He sincerely thought so, we believe. But a review of his manuscripts, much later, showed that from 1920, the author began to falsify the dates of composition of the works, dating them at least twenty years earlier, to appear more pioneering than he was. There was no need. His music is today considered superb, intense, and an original that does not require any fraudulent revision.

Charles Ives (1874 - 1954)

Central Park in the Dark
The piece for orchestra was composed in 1906, conceived as a duo with his best-known work, An Unanswered Question. The idea of presenting the two works together is because both are based on the same experimental premise: the strings create a tenuous and stable atmosphere that remains in the background while the other instruments introduce contrasting, non-synchronous elements that will gradually accelerate.

Its original title is somewhat longer: A Contemplation of Nothing Serious or Central Park in the Dark in the Good Old Summertime. Slightly a long title. But the author himself takes care to explain what it all means:

"...the sounds of nature and events that could be heard thirty years ago, sitting on a bench in Central Park on a hot summer's night. The strings represent the sounds of the night and the silent darkness... interrupted by street singers.... [...] a carriage and a street band join the chorus [...] ...a fire engine... a horse... running away... walkers shout...[...] Darkness is heard again... and we return home."

However, the music that accompanied all this said nothing to some European critics of the time. Some went so far as to maintain that Ives was an amateur with no idea what he was doing. Today's thinking, on the other hand, at the turn of the 21st century, points out that Ives still has something to teach us today, and in terms of new ideas no less.

The performance is by the Budapest Bartok Conservatory Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Hungarian conductor Gergely Dubóczky. 

Tchaikovsky, "Eugenio Onegin", Polonaise

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was 37 years old when the unhappy idea of getting married popped into his mind. The chosen one (although rather the chosen one was him), nine years his junior, was Antonina Miliukova, a former pupil. As it is known, the marriage lasted two and a half months, although, better expressed, that was how long the life "as a couple" lasted. The master kept sneaking Antonina all that time, until he finally deserted the conjugal bed, for good.
The master had to resort to a rest cure. But he recovered:

"There is no doubt that for some months I have been a bit crazy, and only now, being fully recovered, have I learned to relate objectively to everything I did during my brief period of insanity. The man who in May came up with the idea of marrying Antonina Ivanovna, who during June wrote a whole opera as if nothing had happened, who in September ran away from his wife, who in November embarked for Rome and other such things; that man was not me, but another Pyotr Ilyich."

The opera he wrote "as if nothing had happened" is the most recognized and successful of the twelve he composed, Eugene Onegin, an opera in three acts based freely on the homonymous novel in verse by his compatriot Alexander Pushkin. A social and psychological portrait of Russia in the twenties in the nineteenth century.

Very briefly, the story goes like this:
Tatiana, a naive and dreamy girl, falls for the charms of the sophisticated Eugene Onegin when he goes on a visit to the countryside. Tatiana confesses her love to him, but Eugene rejects her. To make it clear, Onegin decides to flirt with Olga, Tatiana's sister, and fiancée of his best friend, Lensky. Enraged by this behavior, Lensky challenges his friend Onegin to a duel. The event ends with Lensky's death. (It is not superfluous to add here that the poet Pushkin died in a duel, in 1837, when he was just over 37 years old). Onegin disappears for a long time. Years later he meets Tatiana, already married, at a party with an old prince. Onegin sees her dancing a cheerful polonaise, more beautiful than ever. This time it is Tatiana who refuses.

Polonaise, from Eugene Onegin, opus 24
Premiered in 1879 in Moscow, the opera received a warm reception, which continues to this day.
As was customary in the lyric theater of the romantic nineteenth century, scenes of dancing and festivities were not to be missed. In the third act, Onegin reunites Tatiana at a party. The guests enjoy themselves dancing a lively polonaise. This polonaise became very popular and today it is customary to include it in the symphonic repertoire as an autonomous piece.

The Saint Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra is conducted by the Russian conductor Yuri Temirkanov.