Program Notes

Despite succumbing to a chronic illness at the young age of 24, Lili Boulanger achieved an extraordinary degree of compositional success in a field that is still dominated by men to this day. As the younger sister of Nadia and daughter of conductor Ernest Boulanger, it could be said that the Boulangers were musical royalty (especially considering that Lili’s mother was a Russian princess). Lili Boulanger’s musical aptitude became evident at the age of two when Gabriel Fauré, a friend of the family, discovered that she had perfect pitch. By the age of five, she was regularly accompanying her sister to music theory classes at the Paris Conservatoire and a few years later Lili was studying not only music theory at the Conservatoire, but also piano, organ, violin, cello, and harp.

Her breakthrough as a composer came when she won the Prix de Rome composition prize in 1913 at the age of 19. Her father had won the award 78 years previously and she was determined to bring it back into the Boulanger family after his death in 1900. Nadia had given up on the competition after four unsuccessful attempts, so not only did the award allow Lili to be taken seriously as a composer in her own right, but it also made her the first female winner in the award’s 110-year history.

It was around this time that Boulanger began working on her Thème et variations for solo piano, with some suggesting it may have originated as a study for the competition. Lili was greatly affected by the death of her father, and as such, many of her compositions feature themes of grief and loss. These emotions are evident in this work: after the theme is stated in the right hand, the first variation begins with the performance direction ‘with grandeur, but dark, painful’, and the heavy minor chords that follow are reminiscent of the opening of Chopin’s Funeral March. The subsequent variations grow increasingly urgent and dissonant. While the entire piece is in C Minor, it transitions through other keys frequently and is an excellent demonstration of the colourful harmony that Lili Boulanger is remembered for, and that Claude Debussy described as ‘undulating with grace.’ The piece is elegant at times, as with the flowing triplets of the 4th variation, and often triumphant, as with the forceful chords of the 5th variation, but an impression of the composer’s grief remains pervasive throughout.

© James Mountain 2021
Commissioned for Musica Viva Australia

Johannes Brahms moved in with Robert and Clara Schumann for several months at the age of 20. History acknowledges Robert’s influence in composition and musicology on his young protégé, and likes to dwell on Brahms’ lifelong attachment to Clara. Often overlooked is that Clara was considered perhaps the greatest pianist of that golden era, admired by Chopin, Liszt and Mendelssohn, and her effect on Brahms’ own pianism cannot have been negligible. The Fantasies, Op. 116 signalled the end of Brahms’ long hiatus from composing piano music, and the Intermezzo in E major is perhaps the most expressive movement of the entire cycle. Originally titled ‘Notturno’, the piece has all the qualities of a nocturne.

© James Mountain 2022
Commissioned for Musica Viva Australia

Chick Corea was a titan of the jazz world and is widely considered to be one of the foremost jazz pianists of all time. Across a recording and performing career that spanned nearly 60 years (and more than 60 Grammy nominations), Corea wrote several jazz standards, of which ‘Spain’ is undoubtedly his most recognisable.

First appearing on Corea’s 1973 album Light as a Feather, ‘Spain’ was inspired by Miles Davis’ recording of ‘Concierto de Aranjuez’ – the first track of the latter’s tremendously influential 1960 album Sketches of Spain. Davis’s recording was itself an arrangement of another ‘standard’ of sorts in the classical repertoire: Joaquin Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez for classical guitar and orchestra. Corea had recorded and toured briefly with Davis’s band, replacing Herbie Hancock in 1968, and Davis’s influence on Corea’s music cannot be overstated.

The original recording of ‘Spain’ on Light as a Feather opens with an arrangement of the Adagio from the Concierto de Aranjuez for electric piano and bowed double bass, before breaking into an energetic samba denoted by the main theme, based on the chord progression from the same movement. ‘Spain’ has been covered by several notable artists since its release including Béla Fleck, Jaco Pastorius, Stevie Wonder and James Galway.

© James Mountain 2022
Commissioned for Musica Viva Australia

Sergei Rachmaninoff composed two sets Études-Tableaux (or ‘study pictures’) for solo piano. Although Rachmaninoff did not believe in dictating for his audience what each piece was meant to represent, instead declaring ‘let [the listener] paint for themselves what it most suggests’, Op. 39 No. 2 is also known as ‘The Sea and the Seagulls’. Both of these elements are clearly audible throughout the study, with rippling waves appearing from the first bar in the left hand and becoming gradually more turbulent throughout, while seagulls fly high above, denoted by the melody in the right hand. If an air of sadness infuses this coastal image, perhaps it is because the Op. 39 Études were the last pieces Rachmaninoff composed before fleeing Russia to escape the turmoil of the Russian Revolution.

© James Mountain 2022
Commissioned for Musica Viva Australia

Although Sergei Rachmaninoff is remembered best for his virtuosic piano concertos and magnificent symphonies, he had an extraordinary output of songs as well, composing some 80 songs for voice and piano between 1890 and 1916.

The Migrant Wind was composed in 1912, alongside 13 other songs that comprise Op. 34, and was dedicated to Leonid Sobinov: one of Russia’s most famous tenors in the early 20th century. Alternating between C major and A minor, the piece explores the inherent conflict between darkness and light. ‘The migrant wind caressed me,’ the first line reads, ‘And whispered sadly: “Night is stronger than day.” And the dusk grew dim. The clouds darkened.’

After a dark night above a turbulent sea, the wind finally announces, ‘the day is stronger than the night.’

Lilacs quickly became immensely popular, perhaps due in part to its radiant contrast to Rachmaninoff’s melancholy vocal music of the 1890s. The piece became so popular in fact that, beginning in 1908, Rachmaninoff received a bouquet of lilacs at every concert he performed in, everywhere in the world until 1918. His anonymous admirer was eventually revealed to be Madame Felka Rousseau, whose only wish was that he return to perform in Russia. Rachmaninoff had fled his country in 1917 following the Russian Revolution, and after explaining that it was unlikely that he would be able to return at all due to the political situation, the lilac bouquets promptly stopped appearing.

Yesterday We Met is a haunting description of a chance encounter with an old flame.

I am no prophet is a fitting end to any program that explores the universal desires and sufferings of the human heart, as all the best artsong seeks to. The lyrics proclaim to the audience ‘I am no prophet, I am no soldier, I am no teacher of the world’. As all of those listed professions rely on communication (or oppression) with other people, the narrator’s message becomes clear: ‘I talk in song to the heart, in which I rouse a divine spark.’

© James Mountain 2022
Commissioned for Musica Viva Australia

Allerseelen and Zueignung were included in the first collection of lieder that Richard Strauss chose to publish at the age of 21 years old. While it may seem unbelievable that such mature reflections on past and lost love could come from a composer so young, Strauss had had plenty of practice. He wrote his first song when he was just six years old and had composed around 36 concert works by the age of nine.

Interpretations of the poem that Allerseelen is set to (written by Hermann von Gilm) vary. The title translates to ‘All Soul’s Day’ – a day in which deceased friends and relatives are commemorated and remembered by their families. In Allerseelen, the narrator takes advantage of the day to remember a lover from their past. Is there a chance that the love affair could be reignited, or is the narrator communicating with their lover from beyond the grave?

Ruhe, meine Seele and Morgen! were wedding presents, from Richard Strauss to his soprano wife Pauline. Pauline Strauss, protective wife of a famous husband, occasionally drew criticism for being eccentric and ill-tempered, but their marriage was by all accounts a happy one and she was a great inspiration for Richard’s musical output. The mighty Zueignung, ‘Dedication’, was composed before they met, but is an apt depiction of their devotion to one another.

© James Mountain 2022
Commissioned for Musica Viva Australia