Brahms, Piano Concerto No 1 - Mov I

 
After Robert Schumann died in a sanatorium in 1856, leaving his wife Clara a widow and the breadwinner of the couple's seven children, family friend Johannes Brahms became as an indispensable support for Clara and, as far as we can imagine, they may have envisioned an eventual union at some point in their future lives, despite the seventeen years difference between Clara and the young musician.

In any case, dreams, if there were any, must have been postponed. Clara had to provide for the care for her children through an endless series of concerts. The young Brahms, a twenty-four-year-old musician, had for his part the urge to consolidate a career as a composer.

In 1857, and after successfully passing a measured examination, Johannes Brahms obtained his first official position upon being hired as a musician of the modest court of Detmold, to serve from September to December of that year. His duties consisted of giving piano lessons to Princess Friederike, directing the choir, and performing as a pianist at the concerts scheduled by the court.

The position had several advantages: the three-month salary was enough to live modestly for a whole year, the princess was a diligent pupil, the choir leadership served his purposes as a professional musician very well, and, above all, he had free mornings, and could dispose of them at will. Johannes occupied them in walking around the surroundings and continue to work on his own compositions, especially those that were already beginning to show a long process of gestation.

Brahms, at 20

Since 1854 he had been working on the composition of a symphony which, not having come to fruition, he tried to transform into a sonata for two pianos, which also did not come to fruition. But the material was there, available. So after his second season in Detmold, and based on the elements that perhaps had resisted taking another form, the Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor finally was born.

Composed in three movements and with a somewhat extended duration, the concerto had a lukewarm premiere in Hanover on January 22, 1859, with Brahms at the piano and his friend Joseph Joachim conducting. Five days later, in Leipzig, it was received with whistles. Today it is considered a masterpiece. Apparently Brahms was right when, at the end of the Leipzig performance, he sent Joachim these words:

"After all, I am still in the experimental phase and am groping my way along. However, come to think of it... the whistling was indeed excessive."

The first movement, maestoso, is presented here in the rendition of the Hungarian pianist Dénes Várjon, accompanied by the Budapest Symphony Orchestra, under the direction of the spirited violinist and conductor, also Hungarian, Gábor Takács-Nagy, in a performance at the Béla Bartók National Hall, Budapest, in 2010.

Antonio Soler, Sonatas for harpsichord

Created in 1373 by Pope Gregory XI (then in Avignon), the monastic order of Saint Jerome prescribes a religious life in solitude, silence, prayer and penance. Delivered to the Lord to such an extreme, the daily activities of the monks of this order would begin at five in the morning and between prayers, lessons and prayers before the Stations of the Cross, they ended at twelve at night with a last exercise of contemplative life and prayer.

Padre Soler
But the Spanish harpsichordist and composer Antonio Soler y Ramos, better known today as Padre Soler, was not deterred by so much personal sacrifice. When he was just over twenty years old he joined the order, ready to lead a life of penance. He had started his musical studies at the age of six, and ten years later he was serving as a chapel teacher in the cathedral of Lleida. In 1752 he held the position of organist and director of the choir of the monastery of San Lorenzo de El Escorial, where he became part of the community of Hieronymite monks of the monastery, and in whose company he remained until his death in 1783.

A huge production
It is amazing, then, that the degree of devotion already mentioned has not been an obstacle for Padre Soler, as a Hieronymite monk, to have composed more than 200 sonatas for harpsichord, 6 quintets for organ and string, 6 concertos for two organs, 9 masses, 25 ecclesiastical hymns, 5 requiem and 60 psalms, in addition to a large number of Magnificats, motets and Christmas carols.

Other contributions
To this vast musical production must be added the construction of an instrument of keys and strings that he called afinador or templante, and the writing of a treatise on harmony, Llave de la modulación y Otras antigüedades de la música (Key of modulation and Antiquities of music), published by the Hieronymite community of El Escorial in 1762, which aroused some controversy for its advanced theories on modulation.

The sonatas
A student of Domenico Scarlatti while he was at El Escorial, Padre Soler is perhaps the most important musician of the 18th century in Spain. Although he differed from his tutor, Soler's music is undoubtedly influenced by the footprint that the Italian composer left in Spain, which is clearly seen in his harpsichord sonatas, especially in the repeated use of crossing hands and large leaps.

Soler's "sonatas" (as well as Scarlatti's) are very short one-movement pieces; They bear that name as the equivalent of "instrumental music" to differentiate them from vocal music ("cantatas") and were intended for the practice of the instrument and the amusement of the performer.

Presented here is the Sonata for harpsichord No. 88 in D minor, performed on piano by the Swiss musician Jean Baptiste Muller.

Moisés Moleiro, Joropo

 
The joropo is a dance and a folkloric rhythm native to the llanos of Venezuela and Colombia, probably originated in the flamenco and Andalusian dances that the conqueror brought from the Old Continent, acquiring here a new appearance although it retained some features such as, for example, the zapateado. As the national dance of Venezuela, it is danced in pairs, on the occasion of popular, cultural and religious festivals, to the beat of music sung by a group of singers accompanied by Venezuelan cuatro, llanera harp and maracas.

Reaching the academy
After the natural decay of the romantic waltzes of the nineteenth century, which in all fairness gained access to a space in academic and salon music in their time, at the beginning of the twentieth-century Venezuelan composers took up an interest in creating works that would elevate indigenous rhythms at the academy level.

Moisés Moleiro
Among many others, this is the case of the pianist and composer Moisés Moleiro, author of sonatinas and toccatas somewhat "scarlattian" but with both syncopation and Venezuelan accent, and whose most popular work ended up being, precisely, a joropo for piano.

Moisés Moleiro (1904 - 1979)

Born in the Guárico state in 1904, Moleiro graduated as a pianist in 1927 and gave his first recital in 1931. True to his customary style of simplicity and transparency, the composer was able to transport to the piano – in 1941– the flavor, the rhythm and the festive character that, in principle, only the cuatro, harp and maracas, could deliver.

Joropo, by Moleiro
A piece of a high technical difficulty, in 6/8 time, Moleiro's Joropo should be an obligatory work in the repertoire of every Latin American pianist aware of his roots, although it is only intended to be performed as an encore, due to its brevity. From beginning to end, the piece rests (the pianist not so much) on an "Alberti bass" as accompaniment. Huge syncopated leaps deliver more rhythmic richness and add another bit of difficulty.

The rendition, magnificent, is by Basco pianist Josu Gallastegui.

Beethoven, Romance for violin No 2

It is generally accepted that the two romances for violin and orchestra were composed around 1802 or 1803. Years that are not exactly encouraging for Beethoven. In 1802 he wrote a document – the famous Heiligenstadt Testament – addressed to his two brothers, Karl and Johann, to whom he confessed with deep regret his deafness, lamenting that he, a musician, had to suffer from such ailment. Despite this intimate confession, the document has been written "to be read after my death."

Overcoming rejection
To make matters worse, that same year he fell in love with his pupil Giulietta Guicciardi, to whom he dedicated the Moonlight sonata. The "damigella contessa" had given the maestro a tepid hope of being reciprocated, but by the end of the year the relationship was completely cooled down. However, Ludwig will show that he is capable of overcoming everything, for very soon afterwards he will begin work on his third symphony, as well as finishing the romanzas or refine the work for publication.

Beethoven, in 1803
by Ch. Horneman

An unfinished concerto
As hinted, it is likely that the two violin romances were written much earlier. What is not in doubt is the date of their publication: No. 1 in G major (which is actually the second) was published in 1803, and No. 2 (the first), in F major, in 1805.

The conjecture comes from the fact that in his youth, around 1790 – Beethoven is twenty years old – he left a violin concerto unfinished, of which his first movement, written in C major, is known.

G and F chords
Not only the harmonic proximity (G and F chords are, respectively, the dominant and subdominant of the C key) but also their stylistic affinity have led to think that, most likely, the romances were originally written for being incorporated, one or the other, as a slow movement to that concerto that did not come to an end. That would not be strange if we remember that Mozart entitled the slow movement of his Concerto No. 20, precisely, "Romance".

What cannot be doubted, in my modest opinion, is that at least in the gently lyrical Romance No. 2 in F major, Opus 50, we are dealing with a strictly classical Beethoven, the early Beethoven than once he was.
It lasts for less than nine minutes.

The rendition is by the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, conducted by Kurt Masur, with Renaud Capuçon as the soloist. 

C.P.E. Bach, concerto for flute in D minor

 
Since the time of the German zither player Veit Bach (around 1555), the first known ancestor of Johann Sebastian Bach (and according to him, his great-great-grandfather), the Bach family gave the world so many musicians that the itinerant musicians who roamed the villages at that time were generically called "Bachs", regardless of whether or not they belonged to the illustrious family.

The progeny of Johann Sebastian
This never-ending brood of musicians who emerged generation after generation, reached its maximum expression with the appearance on the scene of Johann Sebastian Bach, in 1685. Curiously enough, after his death, the output of geniuses or talents will extend only a little further. Of the twenty children born from his two marriages, only survived four of the seven he had with his first wife Maria Barbara and five of the thirteen he later had with Anna Magdalena, Of the nine survivors, five will be prominent musicians, but with them, the production of artists will be concluded.

Carl Philipp Emanuel
The second son born from his relationship with Maria Barbara, and who will later be greatly admired by Mozart, is Carl Philipp Emanuel, who at the age of seven was able to sight-read his father's keyboard pieces, no matter how demanding.

Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach
(1714 - 1788)

Born in Weimar in 1714, despite his peculiar genius, Carl Philipp Emanuel will enter the university to study law obeying the strict indications of his father, because in the case that he later decided to devote to music professionally, as a university-trained man he could aspire in the courts to a more dignified treatment than the one dispensed to the servant proper.

Reluctantly with Frederick 
And so, in 1740 we find him, though not at ease, at the court of Frederick II the Great of Prussia, serving as a court harpsichordist. Although being a law graduate, the relationship with Frederick was not the best and Carl Philipp spent a good few years trying to get another position somewhere else.

"The Bach of Hamburg"
The Seven Years' War, oddly enough, relieved him a little because it kept Frederick away from court. But it was not until 1768 that he was able to leave Frederick for good to go and replace the late Georg Philipp Telemann in the post of chapel master of Hamburg, a position he would hold until his death in 1788. There he was known as "the Bach of Hamburg", to differentiate him, perhaps, from his brother Johann Christian, another talented musician, who in turn was recognized as "the Bach of London".

Sighting the Romanticism

Far removed from the rigorous polyphony of his father, Carl Philipp Emanuel is something of a "proto-romantic". Although his work lays between the baroque and classicism, he was the main representative of the Empfindsamer Stil musical movement, similar to the renowned Sturm und Drang, which foreshadows the first elements of romanticism.

An anecdote about a musical evening at the Bach's house shows Carl Philipp as a pale young man with narrowed eyes and almost "possessed", an adjective that would come in handy with any romantic musician of later years.

Concerto for flute, strings, and basso continuo in D minor, Wq 22

While in the service of Frederick the Great, Carl Philipp composed five flute concertos to be incorporated into the king's repertoire, who in addition to being a composer was a somewhat talented flautist, although he could hardly perform them as this requires the skill of a virtuoso. The Concerto in D minor is regularly performed by soloists around the world, especially due to its incomparably agile first movement (allegro di molto: very lively).
It is presented here in the rendition of the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, conducted by Stephan Mai. The soloist is Christoph Huntgeburth.