Beethoven, Piano Sonata No 31, Op. 110

The last piano works by a deaf composer

When Beethoven wrote his last three sonatas, his deafness was total and irremissible. The only means of communication was his now famous "conversation notebooks", in which those who accompanied him had to write down what they wanted to say to the maestro, to which Beethoven replied verbally or in writing, depending on his mood. His temperament, already suspicious and intolerant, became irritable and bellicose. It is also the time when he struggles for the affection of his nephew Karl, whose legal custody he has gained after the death of his brother Kaspar in 1815.

 
Nevertheless, in 1818 he was able to successfully tackle the enormous challenge of the Hammerklavier Sonata. And in 1820 – a period in which his poor health led him to a state of almost prostration, writing long letters to his friends telling them about the loss of his creative abilities – he will begin, however, the composition of his final triptych in the sonata genre. In 1820, 1821, and 1822 he tackled, consecutively, the composition of the sonatas opus 109, 110, and 111, the last ones.

Beethoven (1770 - 1827) in 1823

"Feeling a new life..."
Beethoven alternated all this work with the composition of the Missa Solemnis and the resolution of the finale of the Ninth Symphony. The work bore fruit. At the dawn of the year 1821, when he began the composition of the Sonata opus 110, the central work of the triptych, he announced to his friends he was "feeling a new life", although his nephew Karl, who lived next to him, continued to be miserly in his affection. His financial situation was no better; there is no letter from those years in which money problems are not mentioned, in one way or another.

Sonata No. 31 in A-flat major, op. 110
Although somewhat overshadowed by the mighty Hammerklavier and the last, the sonata opus 111, it is as grand and imposing as those two, especially the finale fugue, second only to the Grosse Fuge of 1825-26. It is constructed in four movements (although some scholars consider the adagio and fugue a single movement). The finished autograph score bears the date December 25, 1821. For this sonata, the publishers paid Beethoven 30 ducats in January 1822.

Movements:
00:00  Moderato cantabile molto espressivo - An intimate and spiritual beginning.
07:31  Allegro molto - Brief and jovial section.
09:52  Adagio, ma non troppo - Very somber, almost funereal. Perhaps a reflection of the maestro's moods, for the moment.
13:55  Fugue: Allegro, ma non tropo / L'istesso tempo di arioso / Fugue - Begins without pause after the Adagio. It is a serene and expressive theme, perhaps the composer's acceptance of fate.

The performance is by Daniel Barenboim.

Mozart, "A musical joke", K. 522

A good-natured banter from Wolfgang Amadeus

We sincerely believe that Mozart would not have laughed much at the portrayal of him in the film Amadeus. However, we know that he had a robust sense of humor, documented in his letters; and from his compositions, as well, we know that he displayed an equally robust sense of humor in them. In the divertimento known as "A Musical Joke," from 1787, Mozart created a parody of what might have been the work of an unseasoned composer, an inept composer. The piece, therefore, is riddled with awkward moments, crude resolutions, or untraditional accompaniments. The purpose is clearly satirical, although there is no record of Mozart ever revealing that this was his intention.

We also know that Wolfgang was capable of quickly overcoming difficulties and that every time he did so, it was through musical creation, where there was no lack of joyful moments even if the previous events had not been exactly encouraging. And, precisely, the "musical joke" is the first piece incorporated into his personal catalog after the death of his father, although Mozart had already been thinking about it for two years. The other divertimento that accompanies the "joke" in the catalog, incorporated the same summer, also arouses curiosity: the celebrated Eine Kleine Nachtmusik. It is difficult to imagine another two pieces with such opposite purposes and destinies.

The "antics"
The divertimento is crude and mechanical, with passages designed to mimic what would happen with inaccurate or wrong notation or technically clumsy playing. Written for two horns and strings, the horn players are expected to do as they please; thus, in performances it is customary for them to be "ejected" from the stage during the third movement, only to see them return contrite in the fourth and final movement.
But most of the "chascarros" are only understood by musicologists or similar, also because in their time they were destined to the ears of those who had known and listened to poorly gifted contemporary authors of Mozart, as there were some. Researchers also point out a very early use of polytonality, which, who knows if it was, at the time, nothing more than just another "chascarro".

Divertimento for two horns and strings in F major, K. 522
As already tersely noted, the work is written for two horns, two violins, viola, and cello. As for the German title, Ein Musikalischer Spaß, it should be noted that the word Spaß does not necessarily connote a jocular intent. One musicologist has suggested that a more appropriate translation would be: A musical amusement, precisely what a divertimento is intended to be. It is structured in four movements lasting about twenty minutes.

Movements:
00:00  Allegro
03:00  Menuetto and Trio. Maestoso
10:50  Adagio cantabile
15:20  Presto

The performance is by a chamber ensemble from the National Youth Orchestra of Canada.

Gabriel Fauré, Piano Suite "Dolly"

A pretty piece for an old love's daughter

Considered "dangerously modern", the French composer Gabriel Fauré was turned down for the post of professor of composition at the Paris Conservatoire when it became vacant in 1892. But he was offered another position: inspector of music schools in the French provinces. Fauré was almost fifty years old, and married, so, the position suited him well as it provided him with a steady income. He could then give up the private lessons he gave to poorly endowed pupils, but it also meant he had to embark on long journeys across the country. He had been married for less than ten years to Marie Fremiet. The marriage got along conveniently well but Marie began to resent the frequent travels, and as, it is said, Gabriel was very sensitive to female beauty, it was not long before he set his eyes on a new companion.

Meeting Emma
During the 1880s, Fauré wrote songs and short pieces for piano, but he felt insecure about tackling compositions of greater relevance. Slowly, however, his works began to show greater harmonic complexity and melodic lines. It would be in the next decade, inspecting in the provinces the paths along which French music was marching when the author would find his own way. It was precisely in those years that he met the cultivated singer and brilliant conversationalist Emma Bardac.

Emma Bardac (1862 - 1934)

Yes, indeed. Emma Bardac is the second wife of Claude Debussy, whom Emma accompanied until his death in 1918. But in 1890 she was still the happy wife of a banker and remained so, intermittently until she met Debussy. In the meantime, she fell under the spell of Gabriel Fauré who, unlike Debussy, had no intention of abandoning his wife, Marie. They remained good friends (he had two children with her), and Fauré, from wherever his travels took him, would send Marie affectionate letters almost every day.

Gabriel Fauré (c. 1889)
(1845 - 1924)

But Fauré had fallen in love with Emma. For the first time, at almost 50 years of age, he was experiencing a passionate relationship that satisfied him entirely. According to scholars, the affair would have provoked an explosion of creativity in Fauré, as evidenced by a famous song cycle for voice and piano on verses by Verlaine, La Bonne Chanson, opus 61, and the delightful piano suite "Dolly".

"Dolly" Suite for piano four hands, op 56
Emma had a daughter, Helena, called "Dolly", in the family. The six short piano pieces that make up the suite are dedicated to her. Composed between 1893 and 1896, they are intended to celebrate birthdays and other family events in little Dolly's life. Contrary to his custom, Fauré gave the pieces descriptive names: Berceuse - Mi-a-ou - Le Jardin de Dolly - Kitty-valse - Tendresse - Le pas espagnol. The most popular of these is the first, Berceuse, which for years accompanied a famous BBC program in Great Britain.

Thus, Emma Bardac added a first musical gift to one of her daughters. Later will come the cycle Children's Corner, by Debussy, dedicated this time to Chouchou, the nickname of Claude-Emma, their daughter.

The performance is by the Dutch brothers Lucas and Arthur Jussen. In about ten minutes, they perform four of the six pieces that make up the suite:

00:00  Berceuse
03:06  Mi-a-ou
05:02  Le Jardin de Dolly
07:39  Pas Espagnole

Rossini, "Stabat Mater" - Finale

The last years of the master

When the opera William Tell premiered in Paris in August 1829, Gioacchino Rossini was the most famous composer in the world. He was 37 years old.
But that would be his last opera. After the premiere, he took his wife – the dramatic soprano Isabella Colbran – by the arm and went with her to Bologna for a well-deserved vacation. His next engagement with the Paris Opera was scheduled for 1831, so there was nothing to worry about. What no one imagined, not even he himself, was that he would not write another opera for the rest of his life. Rossini was retiring from the stage for good. For the next forty years, the maestro's most famous creations would be, in gastronomy, the turnedos Rossini, and in sacred music, the Stabat Mater.

Rossini's retirement, so early in his long life, is unparalleled in the history of music to this day. Long afterward, it was learned that even while working on William Tell he had considered abandoning his career as an opera composer. Before the premiere, he negotiated with the French government for an annual pension for life, in exchange for writing four operas for the Paris Opera. But after the events of 1830 that deposed Charles X, the potential agreement was definitively canceled. Rossini remained in Paris for a while, weighing the situation. His opera career was over. The maestro never spoke on the subject, but in 1860, eight years before his death, he said, "I decided I had something better to do: to remain silent."

Stabat Mater, the origins
In 1831, Rossini traveled to Spain. He stayed in Madrid for ten days during which he met Manuel Fernández Varela, a state official and great admirer of Rossini, who desired to have a manuscript of the maestro and a Stabat Mater to rival Pergolesi's very famous Stabat Mater. At first, the maestro did not like the idea at all, but finally agreed, on the condition that the manuscript would never be published or sold. Back in Paris, and lacking inspiration, Rossini gave much of the work to a friend, Giovanni Padolini, director of the Italian Theater in Paris. The premiere of the work, half Rossini, half Padolini, took place on Good Friday 1833 in a monastery in Madrid. But in 1837 Fernández Varela died and the work was sold to a publisher, and then published. Rossini panicked.

"Updating" the  work
The scandal would be enormous if it became known that the work did not belong entirely to him. After several vicissitudes, the maestro managed to recover the manuscript. He sat down to rewrite Padolini's work and added new sections, adding a great new finale.

The "updated" Stabat Mater was premiered to great acclaim in Paris on January 7, 1842, thirteen years after Rossini's last Parisian premiere. Three "numbers" had to be repeated and Rossini's name was chanted by an ecstatic crowd.
Maestro Rossini had earned his fame in the craft of popular spectacle, but he was also capable of creating music that was undeniably serious, profound, and transcendent.

Stabat Mater - Finale - "Amen in sempiterna saecula"
The work is a musicalization, a solemn setting to music of the 13th-century Catholic verses, collectively called Stabat Mater, attributed to Pope Innocent III, which describe the sorrow of the Virgin Mary in the presence of the crucified Jesus, and which begin with the words Stabat Mater dolorosa (the Mother was suffering). The verses had already been set to music by Palestrina and Pergolesi, among others, and would later be set to music by Liszt, Dvorak, and Verdi.

Written for choir, orchestra, and four voices, the piece consists of ten sections. The complete work lasts approximately one hour.
Presented here is the finale, Amen, in a performance by the Philharmonia Orchestra and Chorus conducted by Italian maestro Carlo Maria Giulini.

Mozart, Piano Concerto No 23, in A major

His journey, as a pianist, in Vienna

Just after his 28th birthday, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart decided to start behaving like an organized musician. By that time, he had already composed approximately 450 pieces, an impressive body of work that took a lot of work to keep track of. So in February 1784 he acquired a 44-page notebook in Vienna, put an inscription on the cover: "Catalogue of All My Works", and began to record the new compositions one by one. On the left page, he noted the title or some description of the piece, the completion date, and the orchestration. On the right page, he scribbled the first bars, as if they were "cue cards".

Mozart, pianist and composer
When Mozart settled in Vienna in 1781, he did so with the idea of working there as a pianist and composer. The most obvious way of performing both trades lay in the composition of piano concertos, a craft, needless to say, that Wolfgang Amadeus had mastered to perfection. He had already shown proof of this in the six concertos he had composed so far, in addition to the two composed for two and three pianos, not to mention those arrangements for piano and orchestra of movements by other composers. But when he settled in Vienna, and became engaged to be married shortly thereafter, the number of concertos written must have risen steadily. There was a family to support.

Twelve concertos in four years
Thus, in the 1782-83 season he composed three concertos. In 1784 he composed six, the highest point in his Viennese period. From there he drew strength to write another three in the 1785-86 season. But there the good streak ended, and in 1787 he composed none. He wrote one in 1788; none in 1789-90; and a last one in the year of his death. These simple statistics do not tell the whole story of the "pianist Mozart" for he performed many times as a pianist in premieres that did not feature premiere concerts; however, the small account tells us of his career as a pianist during the Viennese years.

Concerto No. 23 in A Major
Thanks to the remarkable Catalog idea, we know that Concerto No. 23 (K. 488) was completed on March 2, 1786. And we also know that the work was begun in 1784, when Mozart was at his best as a pianist in the Habsburg capital. At some point Mozart must have put the work aside (perhaps occupied by the composition of Le Nozze di Figaro), and only finished it in the late winter of 1786, when it was added to the catalog with the date already noted. Most probably, it was first performed a few days later in Vienna, with Mozart at the piano, of course.

Movements:
It is in three movements. The cadenza of the first of them belongs to Mozart. He left it written, something unusual for him.

00:00  Allegro / Joyful and lively, with a touch of melancholy.
11:17  Adagio / Passionately beautiful. His delightful theme was "borrowed" for an Air France advertisement some years ago.
18:31  Allegro assai / An exuberant rondo.

The rendition is by Maurizio Pollini, accompanied by the Vienna Philharmonic conducted by Karl Bohm.