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April 14, 2019: Anne Akiko Meyers, violin; Jason Vieaux, guitar JOHN CORIGLIANO (BORN 1938) Lullaby for Natalie April 14, 2019: Anne Akiko Meyers, violin; Jason Vieaux, guitar One of the most versatile, compelling, and honored composers of the last fifty years, John Corigliano was born into a musical family—his father a longtime concertmaster of the New York Philharmonic and his mother a fine pianist. He studied with Otto Luening at Columbia University, Vittorio Giannini at the Manhattan School of Music, and privately with Paul Creston. He himself has taught at the Manhattan School of Music, worked for radio and television stations, arranged rock tunes, and even written music for commercials. He is on the faculty at the Juilliard School and holds the position of Distinguished Professor of Music at Lehman College, City University of New York, which established a composition scholarship in his name. He is also one of the few living composer to have a string quartet named after him. Corigliano’s Symphony No. 1, composed in response to the AIDS crisis during his residency with the Chicago Symphony, won the Grawemeyer Award and two Grammy Awards. He received the Metropolitan Opera’s first commission in thirty years for The Ghosts of Versailles , which won raves and a 1992 International Classical Music Award. His Second Symphony earned the Pulitzer Prize in 2001, and his best-known work, the film score for The Red Violin , won an Academy Award in 1999 and spawned several pieces, including his Violin Concerto. Mr. Tambourine Man: Seven Poems of Bob Dylan (2000, rescored for orchestra and amplified soprano in 2004) won two Grammy Awards in 2008. The same year Evelyn Glennie premiered his Conjurer for percussion and string orchestra, which won a Grammy in 2013. Embracing many influences, Corigliano writes music that is mostly tonal, sometimes serial, often lyrical, frequently employing brilliant instrumental effects—always aiming to engage and captivate the listener. He composed his lovely Lullaby for Natalie in 2010 at the request of Anne Akiko Meyers’s husband to celebrate the birth of their first as-yet-unborn daughter. Corigliano writes, “After Natalie’s birth, I placed her name in the title, and Anne sent me a video of her playing it for her baby in a crib. The baby, awake at first, was asleep at the end, so either the five-minute lullaby had bored her to sleep or I had lived up to the promise of my title. I will never know.” The tender melody of Lullaby for Natalie features a sweet, rocking three-note gesture, almost as if singing the word “lull-a-by,” which gently weaves its way throughout the piece. The occasional slightly dark harmonies in the outer sections soon melt back into the soothing flow, and a throatier melody marks the middle section, though it too is lulling. Three times a rising scale floats into the stratosphere to bring on the tender melody in slight variants, the last time shortened and drifting off ethereally. Anne Akiko Meyers recorded the original violin and piano version of Lullaby for Natalie with Akira Eguchi on her Mirror in Mirror album and Corigliano’s later version for violin and orchestra with Leonard Slatkin and the London Symphony Orchestra on her American Masters CD. Andy Poxon (see the note for Corelli’s “La Folia” Sonata) artfully arranged the piece for violin and guitar. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

November 20, 2022: Steven Banks, Saxophonist-Composer Xak Bjerken, Piano, Principal Strings of The Met Orchestra WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART (1756-1791) Quartet for oboe (soprano saxophone) and strings, K. 370 November 20, 2022: Steven Banks, Saxophonist-Composer Xak Bjerken, Piano, Principal Strings of The Met Orchestra Mozart was entranced by what he called the “delightfully pure tone” of oboist Friedrich Ramm when they met in Mannheim in 1777. Ramm, who was thirty-three at the time, had served as principal oboe of the Mannheim Court Orchestra since he was nineteen, having joined the orchestra at the age of fourteen! Mozart presented him with a copy of his Oboe Concerto (written for Giuseppe Ferlendis in Salzburg), with which Ramm soon created a sensation. The following year in Paris, Ramm enthusiastically anticipated playing one of the four solo wind parts in Mozart’s newly composed Sinfonia concertante (now lost in its original form). Mozart reported that he “flew into a rage” when he learned its performance had been blocked by the director of the Concert Spirituel, Joseph Legros, owing to the machinations of rival composer Giuseppe Cambini. In the winter of 1780–81, Mozart met up with his friend Ramm again in Munich, where the composer was presenting his opera Idomeneo and where the oboist had moved with the court orchestra when Karl Theodor became Elector of Bavaria. There in the first months of 1781 Mozart wrote his Oboe Quartet for Ramm, thereby adding a priceless gem to the chamber music literature. In this performance, the soprano saxophone (henceforth referred to as “soloist”) takes the oboe part, presenting most of the work’s enchanting melodies and offering brilliant displays of virtuosity, particularly in the finale. Mozart even offers the wind player a chance for a cadenza in the slow movement. Lest this soloistic treatment and the three- rather than four-movement structure suggest a concerto, it should be said that the Quartet still engages the listener in the more intimate discourse of chamber music. Particularly alluring are the interchanges between the soloist and the violin, as in the first movement when Mozart’s “second theme” consists of the violin now rendering the opening theme while the soloist joins in with a soaring countermelody. The slow movement must have displayed Ramm’s singing tone admirably—and now does the same for that of Steven Banks. Indeed, Mozart treats the melody much like that of an aria, exhibiting not only the soloist’s ability to sustain a long line but to negotiate wide leaps such as he often required of his singers. The soloist dominates again in the Rondeau (Mozart employed the French spelling), presenting all three occurrences of the jolly refrain. The second contrasting episode contains an extremely unusual device for Mozart: the soloist switches to duple meter while the violin, viola, and cello carry on merrily in the prevailing triple meter, creating a delightful if brief tension. Passages of rapid figuration and further wide leaps test the soloist’s agility, and several times Mozart’s writing ascends to lofty heights—as at the piece’s conclusion—again demonstrating his full confidence in the artistry of his friend. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

LOS ANGELES GUITAR QUARTET For over three decades on the concert stage, the members of the Grammy® Award-winning Los Angeles Guitar Quartet have continually set the standard for expression and virtuosity among guitar ensembles, while perennially redefining themselves in their musical explorations. Popularly known as the LAGQ, the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet, is recognized as one of America’s premier instrumental ensembles. As one of the most charismatic groups performing today, their critically acclaimed transcriptions of concert masterworks provide a fresh look at the music of the past, while their interpretations of works from the contemporary and world-music realms continually break new ground. The LAGQ has given recitals in many of the world’s top venues, including Chicago’s Orchestra Hall, London’s Wigmore Hall and Southbank Centre, Tokyo Opera City, and New York’s Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall. They have toured extensively in Europe and Asia, where they were featured at the Hong Kong, Singapore and Manila International Arts Festivals and recently made highly successful debuts in China and Australia. The Los Angeles Guitar Quartet kicked off their 2016-17 season with a tour ofGermany. Performances throughout the season continue to span the United States, bringing them to Arizona, California, Colorado, Illinois, Maryland, Massachussetts, Mississippi, New Mexico, New York, Texas, Washington, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. Premiere performances of a new work by guitar legend Pat Metheny, commissioned specifically for them begin in October at Denver’s Newman Center and continue into the 2017-18 season. They bring the electric Rodrigo “Concierto Andaluz” to the Waco Symphony Orchestra and, for the holidays they reprise their beloved “Nutcracker Suite” on subscription and family concerts in San Francisco. Continuing to grow the repertoire for guitar quartet and guitar orchestra, the LAGQ will premiere a new work written by composer and longtime LAGQ member, Andrew York, throughout Arizona in April 2017 and plans to reprise this project in the Washington DC area the following month. Among last season’s highlights are a collaboration with Dweezil Zappa on a new work at the Crown of the Continent Festival in Montana, a reprise of their “Night of Spanish Romance” collaborative program with mezzo-soprano Janelle DeStefano and L.A. Flamenco to capacity crowds, and a tour the Baltics. Additional highlights include LAGQ’s role as Artistic Directors of the 2015 Laguna Beach Music Festival. As the focal point of the festival, they treated audiences to four days of performances, outreach activities and celebrations including: a joint concert with the LA Percussion Quartet, in which the combined octet premiered a new work by composer Jeff Holmes, a “Latin Romance” Valentine’s program with flamenco dancers plus a vocalist, and a closing performance of “The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote: Words and Music from the Time of Cervantes” with guest artist, Firesign Theatre veteran and voiceover actor, Phil Proctor. This last work was captured live at St Louis’ historic Sheldon Theater and released on DVD in March 2012. This multi-disciplinary project was originally developed and premiered in collaboration with the British actor John Cleese in Santa Barbara. Recent seasons have focused on many works written specifically for them including “Interchange,” the concerto written for them by Sergio Assad, and “SHIKI: Seasons of Japan,” a work written for them along with Guitar Orchestra. The world-premiere performance of “SHIKI” took place as part of an extended residency in Loudoun County (VA) a few days after the one-year anniversary of the Japanese earthquake. Since the premiere in 2012, this work, inspired by and dedicated to those affected by the earthquake and tsunami, has been performed in numerous communities throughout the United States. Pushing boundaries once again, the LAGQ participated in the ground breaking 2015 premiere of “How Little You Are” for voices and guitars, by Nico Muhly, one of today’s most sought after composers. The works was hosted by Texas Performing Arts in partnership with the Austin Classical Guitar Society and Conspirare. The Telarc release of “Interchange,” marked the LAGQ’s first recording of concertos by Rodrigo and Assad. “Interchange for Guitar Quartet and Orchestra,” the concerto written specifically for these four virtuosi by Brazilian composer and guitar master, Sergio Assad and featured on the Telarc CD, received a Latin Grammy® nomination for Best Classical Contemporary Composition. “Interchange” premiered at the Southwest Guitar Festival with the San Antonio Symphony in 2010 and was later recorded with the Delaware Symphony and Music Director David Amado, along with the Rodrigo “Concierto Andaluz”. Performing the work at the composer’s official centenary in Spain at the invitation of his daughter, for a “Live with the Boston Pops” television feature, and to a crowd of thousands at the Hollywood Bowl, are especially memorable events. Members of the Quartet also performed and recorded two works of Osvaldo Golijov with the Atlanta Symphony in Atlanta and at the Ojai(CA) and Ravinia(IL) Festivals. The LAGQ’s CD, “Guitar Heroes,” released on Telarc, won the group their first Grammy Award in 2005. It is a heartfelt salute to the great players who inspired the quartet, as individuals and as a group. It has received raves for its unique ability capture the feeling and fervor of diverse musical styles such as jazz, bluegrass, rock and flamenco. In November 2008, this recording joined those by artists such as the Who, Pink Floyd and Dire Straits on Sound and Visions “Top 10 Surround Discs of All Time”. Their first Telarc CD, “LAGQ – Latin,” features their popular transcription of Bizet’s Carmen, along with works from Chile, Cuba and some new original works by members of the quartet. This CD, which has received raves from listeners and critics alike, received a 2003 Grammy nomination and the Super Audio CD (SACD) version won the award for “Best Made for Surround” at the 1st Annual Surround Music Awards. The LAGQ’s release, “SPIN” (Telarc, 2006), shows yet again that the group is equally at home in a wide variety of musical genres and also features several commissioned works from their recent collaboration with percussionist Colin Currie. LAGQ-Brazil (Telarc, 2007) continues to receive raves and includes performances with singing sensation Luciana Souza. The LAGQ’s “Interchange” CD (Telarc, March 2010) features their long-awaited recording of Joaquin Rodrigo’s “Concierto Andaluz” and the premiere recording of Sergio Assad’s “Interchange” with the Delaware Symphony Orchestra. The DVD of “The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote” (March 2012) appears on the Mel Bay Artist Series, along with their first live-concert DVD. Their newest recording, entitled “New Renaissance,” released in March 2015 is a modern take on classic works. It includes long-awaited instrumental works from “Music from the Time of Cervantes”, and new works by Bogdanovic and Krouse, among others.

ELAINE DOUVAS, OBOE Elaine Douvas has been principal oboe of the Metropolitan Opera since 1977 and was principal oboe of the Atlanta Symphony for four years prior. Her career highlights include the Strauss Oboe Concerto with the MET Orchestra at Carnegie Hall, James Levine conducting. In 2017, Douvas was invited to serve as Chairman of the Jury for the Munich ARD International Oboe Competition. She has recorded several solo CDs on Boston Records, Oboe Classics, Music Minus One, and one with her quartet “Pleasure is the Law”: flute, oboe, cello, and piano. Equally devoted to her career as a teacher, Ms. Douvas has served on the oboe faculty of The Juilliard School since 1982, The Mannes College of Music since 1981, and the Bard College Conservatory since 2009. In her capacity as Chairman of the Woodwind Department at Juilliard, she teaches career development and attitudes for career longevity! Her students hold positions in numerous orchestras and university faculties. In the summers she is a long-time artist-faculty member of the Aspen Music Festival and School, and she has given master classes and week-long seminars across the USA, as well as Canada, England, and China. Douvas lives in Ridgewood, New Jersey with her husband Robert Sirinek, former trumpeter with the Met and Orchestra Manager since 1986. They have two grown daughters, Portia and Margot, both pursuing careers in medicine. For over twenty years she has devoted her spare time to figure skating and has passed eleven USFSA tests in free-style and “moves in the field”.

THE CALIDORE STRING QUARTET The Calidore String Quartet has been praised by the New York Times for its “deep reserves of virtuosity and irrepressible dramatic instinct” and by the Los Angeles Times for its balance of “intellect and expression.” After their Kennedy Center debut the Washington Post proclaimed that “Four more individual musicians are unimaginable, yet these speak, breathe, think and feel as one…The grateful audience left enriched and, I suspect, a little more human than it arrived.” The Calidore String Quartet has enjoyed an impressive number of accolades, including their most recent award of the 2018 Avery Fisher Career Grant, and the 2017 Lincoln Center Emerging Artist Award. The Calidore made international headlines as the winner of the $100,000 Grand-Prize of the 2016 M-Prize International Chamber Music Competition, the largest prize for chamber music in the world. Also in 2016, the quartet became the first North American ensemble to win the Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship and was named BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artists, an honor that brings with it recordings, international radio broadcasts and appearances in Britain’s most prominent venues and festivals. Formed in 2010 at the Colburn School in Los Angeles, the quartet has also received top prizes in the ARD Munich, Fischoff, Coleman, Chesapeake and Hamburg competitions. The Calidore String Quartet regularly performs in prestigious venues throughout North America, Europe and Asia such as Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, Kennedy Center, Wigmore Hall, Berlin Konzerthaus, Brussels BOZAR, Cologne Philharmonie, Seoul’s Kumho Arts Hall and at many significant festivals, including the BBC Proms, Verbier, Ravinia, Mostly Mozart, Music@Menlo, Rheingau, East Neuk and Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The Calidore have given world-premieres of works by Caroline Shaw, Hannah Lash and Benjamin Dean Taylor. The Calidore has collaborated with many esteemed artists and ensembles, including Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Joshua Bell, David Shifrin, Inon Barnatan, Paul Coletti, David Finckel, Wu Han, Paul Neubauer, Ronald Leonard, Paul Watkins, and the Emerson and Ebéne Quartets, among others. The Calidore has studied closely with such luminaries as the Emerson Quartet, David Finckel, Andre Roy, Arnold Steinhardt, Günther Pichler, Guillaume Sutre, Paul Coletti, Ronald Leonard and the Quatuor Ebène. The Calidore String Quartet’s debut album for Signum Records, including quartets by Mendelssohn, Prokofiev, Janáček and Golijov, will be released in October 2018. The Calidore String Quartet’s other three commercial recordings include quartets by Tchaikovsky and Mendelssohn, recorded live in concert at the 2016 Music@Menlo Festival; Serenade: Music from the Great War, featuring music for String Quartet by Hindemith, Milhaud and Stravinsky, Ernst Toch and Jacques de la Presle on the French label Editions Hortus; and the quartet’s February 2015 debut recording of quartets by Mendelssohn and Haydn for which Gramophone dubbed the Calidore String Quartet “the epitome of confidence and finesse.” The Calidore were featured as Young Artists-in-Residence on American Public Media’s Performance Today and their performances have been broadcast on National Public Radio, BBC, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, SiriusXM Satellite Radio, Korean Broadcasting Corporation, Bayerischer Rundfunk (Munich), Norddeutscher Rundfunk (Hamburg), and were featured on German national television as part of a documentary produced by ARD public broadcasting. As a passionate supporter of music education, the Calidore String Quartet is committed to mentoring and educating young musicians, students and audiences. The Calidore serves as visiting guest artists at the University of Delaware School of Music and has conducted master classes and residencies at Princeton, Stanford, the University of Michigan, Stony Brook University and UCLA. Using an amalgamation of “California” and “doré” (French for “golden”), the ensemble’s name represents a reverence for the diversity of culture and the strong support it received from its home of origin, Los Angeles, California, the “golden state.”

February 16, 2020: Ying Fang, soprano; Ken Noda, piano SERGEI RACHMANINOFF (1873–1943) Six Songs, Op. 38: In My Garden at Night, To Her, Daisies, Pied Piper, Dreams, A-oo February 16, 2020: Ying Fang, soprano; Ken Noda, piano Rachmaninoff composed all of his approximately ninety songs in the first half of his life—the first in 1890, when he was a student at the Moscow Conservatory, and his final set, op. 38, in 1916, the year before he left Russia for what turned out to be the last time. This last collection and the one before, op. 34, came about in part through a fan letter he received in 1912 from someone signed “Re.” Soon discovering that the sender was poet Marietta Shaganian, he wrote to ask for suggestions of poems to set, saying: “The authors may be living or dead—it makes no difference!—only that the things must be original, not translations, and must be no more than 8 to 12 lines long, at most 16. And one more thing: the mood should be sad rather than happy. The lighter shades don’t come easily to me!” Of the fourteen songs in Opus 34, half, he wrote to Shaganian, were ones she had suggested and analyzed for him. Most were Romantic poets with the addition of the more modern Bal’mont. For the Opus 38 set, she again provided texts for him, trying to turn his conservative tastes toward more contemporary symbolist poets, such as Blok, Bryusov, Severyanin, Sologub, and again Bal’mont. Though the composer had noted his affinity for dark moods, which had characterized his earlier songs, these two last sets for the most part transmit more peaceful, uplifting, and even humorous aspects than gloomy ones. Rachmaninoff had plenty of reason for gloom in the fall of 1916 because he was being treated at a sanatorium in Essentuki for tiredness and a pain in his wrist. Shaganian visited him there and described his state of total despair and self-doubt saying that he broke into tears several times as he described his inability to work and the galling idea that it was impossible to be anything more than “a well-known pianist and a mediocre composer.” She ended her lengthy description saying, “He spoke of the impossibility of living in the state he was, and all this in a terrible dead voice, almost that of an old man, with his eyes lifeless and his face grey and ill.” It was during that visit that she gave him a notebook full of her suggestions of poems to set, just as she had done four years earlier. This helped to jolt him out of his creative slump, but he was also aided by visits from other friends, his move out of the sanatorium to nearby spa city Kislovodsk—and above all spending time with the young soprano Nina Pavlovna Koshetz, whom he had accompanied in a recital that spring and who had also visited him at Essentuki. They made plans for another concert, he composed the Opus 38 Songs in August and September, and they premiered them in Moscow in October 24. Rachmaninoff opens the Six Songs with the haunting “In My Garden at Night,” his setting of Alexander Blok’s translation of Avetik Isaakian’s poem, in which he responds to the images of the weeping willow—metaphorically a lovelorn maiden—with simple, melancholic unmeasured phrases. The second half rises to an impassioned peak at “bitterly” as the poem promises that “tender maiden dawn” will dry weeping willow’s tears. “To Her” continues the lovelorn theme, this time a poem by Andrey Bely in which each of three verses ends with the poet calling futilely to his beloved. Rachmaninoff allows great metric freedom in his through-composed setting but preserves the structural text refrains with recognizably similar but ingeniously varied, impassioned phrases. Other striking features include the opening five-note chromatic gesture, which permeates the setting even when the accompaniment becomes more dense, and the fluid music for the river Lethe, the mythological river in Hades that causes forgetfulness. For “Daisies,” op. 38, no. 3, Rachmaninoff chose a 1909 unassuming nature poem by Igor Severyanin. His setting exudes charm with its treble-oriented sonorities, its graceful, independent melodies for the voice and the piano right-hand, and its memorable extended piano postlude. “The Pied Piper,” fourth in the set, shows Rachmaninoff’s rarely seen humorous side as he responds to Valery Yakovlevich Bryusov’s 1914 poem, itself a play on the famous legend. The piper lures—not rats or children—but his beloved out of her house with the enticing sounds of his flute. Rachmaninoff delightfully depicts the flute in both the voice and piano parts. In “A Dream,” op. 38, no. 5, Rachmaninoff responds ingeniously to poet Fyodor Sologub’s images of disembodied dreaming. His atmospheric piano part uses various bell-like sounds—a favorite device of his—to set the scene for the soaring vocal lines. Placed last in Opus 38, “A-oo” sets a 1909 poem by Konstantin Dmitriyevich Bal’mont in which a lover remembers fondly the laughter of his beloved and a dream of them running together to a mountain slope. Rachmaninoff’s pianistic shimmer aptly conveys the poet’s eager, anticipation of finding her, his agitated chords and short vocal phrases portray the lover’s confusion at not finding her, and the music builds to an incredibly impassioned peak as the lover calls “A-oo” hoping she’ll answer back. That hope clearly dies in the piano postlude, which trails off in open-ended quiet. © Jane Vial Jaffe Texts and Translations Ночью в саду у меня Ночью в саду у меня Плачет плакучая ива, И безутешна она Ивушка, Грустная ива. Раннее утро блеснет, Нежная девушка Зорька Ивушке, плачущей горько, Слёзы кудрями сотрет. —Alexander Blok In My Garden at Night At night in my garden a weeping willow weeps, and she is inconsolable, weeping willow, sad willow. When early morning shines tender maiden dawn will dry bitterly weeping willow’s tears with her curls. К ней Травы одеты перлами. Где-то приветы Грустные слышу, Приветы милые . . . Милая, где ты, Милая! Вечера светы ясные, Вечера светы красные Руки воздеты: Жду тебя, Милая, где ты, Милая? Руки воздеты: Жду тебя, В струях Леты смытую Бледными Леты струями… Милая, где ты, Милая! —Andrey Bely To Her Pearls adorn the grass. From somewhere I hear mournful greetings, Cherished greetings . . . Dear one, where are you? Dear one! The lights of evening are clear, The lights of evening are red, My arms raised, I await you, Dear one, where are you? Dear one? My arms raised, I await you; In the streams, Lethe washes the years away, Pale Lethe, In the streams, Dear one, where are you? Dear one! (Маргаритки) О, посмотри! как много маргариток— И там, и тут . . . Они цветут; их много; их избыток; Они цветут. Их лепестки трёхгранные—как крылья, Как белый шёлк . . . В них лета мощ! В них радость изобилья! В них слетлый полк. Готовь, земля, цветам из рос напиток, Дай сок стеблю . . . О, девушки! о, звезды маргариток! Я вас люблю . . . —Igor Severyanin Daisies Oh, look! how many daisies— here and there . . . they are blooming; so many; they are abundant. they are blooming. Their petals are triangluar—like wings, like white silk . . . they have the power of summer! the joy of abundance! they are a radiant regiment. Earth, prepare the flowers a drink of dew, give the stems juice. Oh, maidens, oh starry daisies, I love you! Крысолов Я на дудочке играю,— Тра-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля, Я на дудочке играю, Чьи-то души веселя. Я иду вдоль тихой речки, Тра-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля, Дремлют тихие овечки, Кротко зыблются поля. Спите, овцы и барашки, Тра-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля, За лугами красной кашки Стройно встали тополя. Малый домик там таится, Тра-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля, Милой девушке приснится, Что ей душу отдал я. И на нежный зов свирели, Тра-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля, Выйдет словно к светлой цели Через сад через поля. И в лесу под дубом темным, Тра-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля, Будет ждать в бреду истомном, В час, когда уснет земля. Встречу гостью дорогую, Тра-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля, Вплоть до утра зацелую, Сердце лаской утоля. И, сменившись с ней колечком, Тра-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля-ля, Отпущу ее к овечкам, В сад, где стройны тополя. —Valery Yakovlevich Bryusov Pied Piper I play upon my little pipe,— tra-la-la-la-la-la-la, I play upon my little pipe, making people’s souls merry. I walk along a quiet stream, tra-la-la-la-la-la-la, gentle lambs doze, Fields wave softly. Sleep, sheep and lambs, tra-la-la-la-la-la-la, beyond the meadows of red clover slender poplars rise. A little house is hidden there, tra-la-la-la-la-la-la, a sweet girl will dream that I gave her my soul. And at the gentle call of my flute, tra-la-la-la-la-la-la, she will come as if to a radiant goal, through the garden, through the fields. And in the forest under a dark oak, tra-la-la-la-la-la-la, she will wait in dazed delirium for the hour when the earth falls asleep. I shall meet my dear guest, tra-la-la-la-la-la-la, I shall kiss her until morning, assuaging my heart with caresses. And once we have exchanged rings, tra-la-la-la-la-la-la, I’ll let her go to the lambs, to the garden with the slender poplars. Son (Сон) В мире нет ничего Дожделеннее сна, Чары есть у него, У него тишина, У него на устах Ни печаль и ни смех, И в бездонных очах Много тайных утех. У него широки, Широки два крыла, И легки, так лёгки, Как полночная мгла. Не понять, как несёт, И куда и на чем Он крылом не взмахнет И не двинет плечом. —Fyodor Sologub Dream There is nothing in the world better than sleep, he has an enchantment, he silence. He has on his lips neither sadness nor laughter and in bottomless eyes many secret pleasures. He has wide, two wide wings, and they are light, so light like a midnight shadow. How he carries you is unknown, and where, on what, he won’t flap his wing And he will not move his shoulder. Ау Твой нежный смех был сказкою изменчивою, Он звал как в сон зовёт свирельный звон. И вот венком, стихом тебя увенчиваю. Уйдём, бежим вдвоем на горный склон. Но где же ты? Лишь звон вершин позванивает Цветку цветок средь дня зажег свечу. И чей-то смех все в глубь меня заманивает. Пою, ищу, Ау! Ау! кричу. —Konstantin Dmitrevich Bal’mont A-oo! Your gentle laughter was a volatile fairy tale, calling like a flute in a dream. Now I crown you with a wreath of verse. Let’s go, let’s run together to the mountainside. But where are you? Only the sound of the heights is ringing a flower for another flower lit a candle midday. And someone’s laughter deep inside lures me. I sing, I search, “A-oo!” “A-oo!” I shout. Return to Parlance Program Notes

November 2, 2014 – Sharon Isbin, guitar ENRIQUE GRANADOS (1867–1916) Spanish Dance in E minor, Op. 37, no. 5 November 2, 2014 – Sharon Isbin, guitar Enrique Granados is known chiefly for his colorful Spanish Dances (1892–1911) and his Goyescas (1911), piano pieces inspired by the paintings and etchings of Goya. He achieved great fame as a pianist in his native Spain and in Paris, where he had studied for two years, but his intense dislike of travel limited his touring. Many of Granados’s activities centered around Barcelona, where he had received much of his early musical training. In 1901 he founded a school there—the Academia Granados. Tragically, travel was at the heart of his untimely death. In 1916 he had reluctantly made the sea voyage to attend the Metropolitan’s highly successful premiere of his opera Goyescas , and had postponed his voyage home in order to play for President Woodrow Wilson. Having missed his ship to Spain, he sailed instead to Liverpool where he boarded the Sussex for Dieppe. The Sussex was torpedoed by a German submarine and, though Granados was picked up by a lifeboat, he jumped into the water to save his wife; both were drowned. Granados had published his Spanish Dances in four sets of three beginning in 1892. They were greatly admired by Massenet, Cui, Saint-Saëns, and Grieg because of their new and distinctive expression of folk characteristics of many different regions of Spain. TheDances are often referred to by descriptive titles, only one of which—Villanesca (No. 4)—appeared in the original edition. Several of the Dances acquired titles when they were published separately during Granados’s lifetime. The famous No. 5 is often referred to as “Andaluza” as it represents that southern region of Spain. It follows a simple A-B-A form, with the interesting touch that the chordal “B” section is previewed toward the end of the “A” section. The strumming and picking effects that the piano imitated in the original, return to the instrument of their inspiration in the transcription by Miguel Llobet. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

November 4, 2018: Alessio Bax and Lucille Chung, pianos; Yoobin Son, flute; Pascual Martinez-Fortese, clarinet; Sheryl Staples, violin; Qian-Qian Li, violin; Cynthia Phelps, viola; Eileen Moon, cello; Tim Cobb, bass; Barry Centanni, xylophone CAMILLE SAINT-SAËNS (1835-1921) The Carnival of the Animals 2018 November 4, 2018: Alessio Bax and Lucille Chung, pianos; Yoobin Son, flute; Pascual Martinez-Fortese, clarinet; Sheryl Staples, violin; Qian-Qian Li, violin; Cynthia Phelps, viola; Eileen Moon, cello; Tim Cobb, bass; Barry Centanni, xylophone Saint-Saëns’s popularity as a pianist, organist, and composer was so great that in the 1890s his picture appeared in a series of cards depicting famous people included with packets of chocolate, in the same way that pictures of famous baseball players were wrapped with bubble gum in America. (The bubble gum disappeared from such packets only in the twenty-first century.) He naturally composed works featuring his own instruments, but he also composed operas, symphonies, chamber music, and many songs. Most of these were serious pieces, but he also had a sense of humor, which surfaced, for example, in his Odors of Paris for piano, harp, trumpet, bagpipe, tin whistle, bird warbler, cuckoo, quail, bass drum, and humming top. He never published the piece, however, for fear it would damage his reputation. For the same reason, he did not allow his Carnival of the Animals to be published or played in public while he was still alive, though it was played in private performances. Saint-Saëns composed the piece in just a few days in February 1886 as a surprise for the annual Shrove Tuesday concert of his cellist friend Charles-Joseph Lebouc. The two first performed it with a small group of instrumentalists—two pianos, flute doubling piccolo, clarinet, glass harmonica (now usually played on glockenspiel or celesta), xylophone, and string quintet—though the work has since been played more often by a larger orchestra. The first public performance took place on February 25, 1922, only two months after Saint-Saëns died. He was proved right in a way: the piece became so popular that much of his “serious” music was overlooked. Saint-Saëns’s inspired portrayals go beyond typical animal specimens to include pianists, fossils, and even habitats, as in Aviary and Aquarium. Often a famous actor or the conductor will describe the pieces during modern performances, especially for educational or young people’s concerts—or they recite the delightful accompanying poems that Ogden Nash wrote in 1949. Many others have since supplied humorous verses, among them Peter Schikele, Bruce Adolphe, and John Lithgow. This afternoon’s performance is enhanced by Frances Button’s amusing poems. Saint-Saëns’s fourteen movements include: The Introduction and Royal March of the Lion: The king of beasts is presented in a majestic march. The lion’s roars are heard in the piano parts. Hens and Roosters: The pianos and strings, with the addition of clarinet, depict pecking and squawking. Wild Tibetan Donkeys: These animals are known for their speed and are imitated by the two pianos alone in fast, running notes. Turtles: Saint-Saëns made a great joke here by transforming Jacques Offenbach’s famous and lively can-can from Orpheus in the Underworld into a piece representing some of nature’s slowest animals. The Elephant: The composer continues his fun by having the bass line represent the elephant with a lumbering version of a delicate, fairy-like piece by Hector Berlioz called “Dance of the Sylphs.” The composer also recalls a bit of the Scherzo from Felix Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream , another exquisite bit of fairy music. Kangaroos: The pianists represent these jumpers, sometimes taking short hops and sometimes making giant leaps. Aquarium: Rippling figures create a beautiful water picture. The part usually played by the glockenspiel was originally intended for the glass harmonica. This instrument, invented by Benjamin Franklin, was played by rubbing wet, tuned glass disks (like water goblets at the dinner table). Characters with Long Ears: The raucous braying of mules is imitated by the violins alone. The Cuckoo in the Depth of the Woods: The pianos play muted chords while the clarinet adds the voice of the cuckoo. Aviary: This habitat houses the fluttering creatures depicted by the flute while the strings play tremolo (quick repeated notes) and the pianos add bird calls. Pianists: The composer makes fun of beginning pianists practicing their exercises. Fossils: Here the xylophone suggests old bones. Saint-Saëns quotes six old tunes or “fossils” of music: his own Danse macabre (which had also used xylophone to suggest skeletons), French folk songs “J’ai du bon tabac” (I have some good tobacco), “Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman” (Ah! I’ll tell you, Mother, also known as “Twinkle, Twinkle” or “Baa-Baa Black Sheep”), “Au clair de la lune” (In the moonlight), and “Partant pour la Syrie” (Leaving for Syria), and finally an aria from Rossini’s opera The Barber of Seville . The Swan: This most famous movement, written for the composer’s cellist friend, was the only part of the Carnival that Saint-Saëns allowed to be published in his lifetime. The piece was made into a very popular ballet even while the composer was alive, and its beautiful melody has been arranged for almost every instrument. Finale: The work closes with a grand mixture of several of the animals we’ve met: the lion, the wild Tibetan donkeys, a few hens, roosters, and kangaroos, and, at the end, some jeers from the long-eared characters. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

September 24, 2017: Mark Holloway, viola; Michael Brown, piano FÉLICIEN DAVID (1810-1876) La nuit September 24, 2017: Mark Holloway, viola; Michael Brown, piano One of the world’s great violin prodigies, Henry Vieuxtemps also grew equally proficient on the viola, which he sometimes played in string quartets, a genre he loved. As a composer he developed largely on his own after some preliminary instruction from Simon Sechter in Vienna and Antoine Reicha in Paris. He gravitated naturally to the violin genres, but he also wrote chamber music—his three string quartets stand out in particular—and a select few viola compositions. His gently flowing La nuit for viola and piano draws on the “rêverie du soir” from Le désert, the programmatic ode-symphonie by Félician David that took Paris by storm in 1844. David had spent some years in Egypt to preach the Saint-Simonian gospel in hopes of restoring Egypt to its ancient greatness. His explorations there led to this descriptive work for soloists, male chorus, reciter and orchestra, which won extravagant praise from Berlioz. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

November 19, 2017: Los Angeles Guitar Quartet PHILLIP HOUGHTON Opals November 19, 2017: Los Angeles Guitar Quartet Phillip Houghton (b. 1954) is one of the most recorded and influential Australian guitars composers. His work expresses a distinctly Australian aesthetic, reflecting the country’s vast landscapes and mystical “dreamtime” Aboriginal legends. He is famously a synesthete, wherein he sees very specific colors when he hears musical tones and timbres. “Opals” (1993, revised 2014) is a three-movement work for guitar quartet, and it attempts to capture the myriad glints and sparkles emanated by Australia’s opalescent national gemstone. In the score, there are detailed notes describing the particular colors and sheens that the music attempts to evoke. The composer provided the following notes for each movement: Rather than being pitch-black, the Black Opal is a stone of fantastic colour. Electric reds, purples, blues and greens of every shade predominate and refract and collide, in a fiery rainbow of splinters of brilliant light against a dark matrix. One could say that the opal is “made” from water, and, in the “Water Opal” movement, I imagined a kaleidoscope of colour in and against a transparent “water matrix”…colours floating, bleeding into each other. Against a white matrix the lighter colours of the White Opal are brilliant and translucent. Evident in this stone is what is called “pinfire” (glittering points of red and green) and the “rolling flash” (which describes the effect of layers of colour which, ripple abruptly and sparkle through the stone when the stone is moved). © William Kanengiser Return to Parlance Program Notes