Jean Philippe Rameau (1683 - 1764) Pièces de Clavecin en Concerts Each of Jean Philippe Rameau’s Pièces de Clavecin en Concerts comprises a suite of movements evoking the theatrical dances of his time. In this evening’s concert, we perform the fifth piece. Each movement celebrates, in a brief and poignant caricature, one of the composer’s esteemed professional colleagues. La Forqueray recalls the dramatic, intricate musicianship of composer/violist da gamba Antoine Forqueray (1671 to 1745). La Cupis pays homage to Marie Anne de Cupis de Camargo (1710 to 1770), the principal dancer in many of Rameau’s theatrical productions and perhaps the prima ballerina of the 18th century. Her technique and innovations influenced a sea-change in professional dance. It was Camargo who introduced the heelless ballet slipper and shortened the dance costume to, what was then, a scandalous mid-calf length. La Marais summons, in buoyant arpeggios, the often joyful and ever soulful performances of composer and viola da gamba virtuoso Marin Marais. Marais and Forqueray were the French eighteenth-century equivalents of dueling superstars. One chronicler recorded that, whereas Marais played like an angel, Forqueray played like The Devil! Robert Russell Bennett (1894 - 1981) Seven Post Cards to Old Friends (1966) The greater part of Robert Russell Bennett’s illustrious career, like that of Jean Philippe Rameau two centuries earlier, was devoted to music for the stage. Bennett was perhaps the 20th century’s most prolific, successful, and influential arranger of American music for theatre, film, and television. Just as the Fifth Pièce de Concert celebrates Rameau’s colleagues, Seven Post Cards to Old Friends portrays several of Bennett’s esteemed collaborators in a suite of brief dance-influenced movements. Here is a very abridged list of Bennett’s collaborations, to give some context for his Post Cards: With Irving Berlin, Robert Russell Bennett arranged Annie Get Your Gun (1946); with Jerome Kern: Show Boat (1927, re-orchestrated in 1946 and again in 1966); with George Gershwin: Girl Crazy (1930) and Of Thee I Sing (1931); with Cole Porter: Anything Goes (1934), Jubilee (1935), and Kiss Me Kate (1948); with Richard Rodgers: Oklahoma! (1943), South Pacific (1949), The King and I (1951), Flower Drum Song (1958), and The Sound of Music (1959); with Vincent Youmans: No, No, Nanette! (1925); and with Noel Coward: The Girl Who Came to Supper (1963). Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach (1714 - 1788) "Quartet" for keyboard, flute and viola in D Major Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, the second son of J.S. Bach, served for thirty years at the court of that most musical of sovereigns, Frederick the Great of Prussia. In 1768, C.P.E Bach embraced freedom from Frederick’s patronage when granted permission to leave court and become Kapellmeister in Hamburg, filling the position held by his late godfather, Georg Philipp Telemann. Educated primarily by his father, C.P.E. Bach was perhaps the most influential musician of his era. His formidable skill as a composer, keyboardist, and music theorist informed the tastes and techniques of generations of musicians. Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven revered him. C.P.E. Bach was a progenitor of what became known as the “Empfindsamer Stil,” a rhetorically powerful and emotionally dynamic “Sensitive style” of musical expression. Empfindsamer Stil moved beyond the prevailing gallant style toward the passionate sonic gestures that we hear in Haydn, then Beethoven, and then Von Weber. The Quartet in D Major Wq 94 is one of three quartets for keyboard, flute, and viola that C.P.E. Bach composed during the last year of his life. (The left and right hands of the keyboard player function as separate instrumental voices; hence, a quartet for three musicians.) The composer’s frail health is revealed, in the manuscript of this work, by his tremulous handwriting, but belied by the strength of the composition. As the manuscript unfolds, Bach’s penmanship becomes steadier, ever surer, and more robust. Our composer is visibly encouraged and uplifted by his work as he approaches the end. Karl Henning (1960 - ) Oxygen Footprint Op 138 (2016) Karl Henning holds a B.Mus. from the College of Wooster (Ohio); an M.A. from the University of Virginia; and a Ph.D. in composition from the University of Buffalo, where he studied with Charles Wuorinen and Louis Andriessen. He has concertized as a clarinetist in Estonia, Russia, and throughout the United States, and his music has been performed in North America, Europe and Australia. Oxygen Footprint was written for Ensemble Aubade and received its premiere in 2016 at Church of the Advent in Boston. The title is inspired by a popular term describing one aspect of an individual's environmental impact. Henning’s idea is to manifest an airy impact. And "footprint" suggests the dance. Oxygen Footprint is a sort of ballet suite in miniature, starting vigorously and with frequent syncopation. The music makes its way to a dreamy-yet-insistent gigue and a calm yet emotional core. Carl Maria von Weber (1786 - 1826) Trio in G Minor, Op. 63 (1819) The program concludes with Carl Maria von Weber’s Trio Opus 63. The piece was written during a particularly productive period in the composer’s career. Recently married, von Weber was working on a number of projects, including the opera Der Freischütz (a defining moment in German romanticism that would later influence Richard Wagner); The Invitation to the Dance (an exuberant pianistic gem that employed the scintillating gestures of the, then-new, waltz); and our majestic, dramatic Trio in G Minor. The trio was written for Von Weber’s friend Anton Bernhard Fürstenau. The two musicians first met in Prague in 1815 and soon developed a working friendship that would endure throughout von Weber’s life. Fürstenau, arguably the preeminent flutist in 19th Century Europe, was appointed principal flutist in von Weber’s Dresden Orchestra in 1820. The two musicians collaborated extensively in orchestral and chamber music projects for the following six years. Fürstenau was present at von Weber’s death in London, in June of 1826 -- a sadly premature ending to their fruitful collaboration. © Peter H. Bloom 2018