Symphony No. 1 (Rachmaninoff)
Encyclopedia
Opus number
An Opus number , pl. opera and opuses, abbreviated, sing. Op. and pl. Opp. refers to a number generally assigned by composers to an individual composition or set of compositions on publication, to help identify their works...
13, is a music piece by Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninoff
Sergei Rachmaninoff
Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of the last great representatives of Romanticism in Russian classical music...
, written at Ivanovka, an estate near Tambov
Tambov
Tambov is a city and the administrative center of Tambov Oblast, Russia, located at the confluence of the Tsna and Studenets Rivers southeast of Moscow...
, Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
, between January and October 1895. Despite its poor initial reception the symphony is currently seen as a dynamic representation of the Russian symphonic tradition, with British composer Robert Simpson
Robert Simpson (composer)
Robert Simpson was an English composer and long-serving BBC producer and broadcaster.He is best known for his orchestral and chamber music , and for his writings on the music of Beethoven, Bruckner, Nielsen and Sibelius. He studied composition under Herbert Howells...
calling it "a powerful work in its own right, stemming from Borodin
Alexander Borodin
Alexander Porfiryevich Borodin was a Russian Romantic composer and chemist of Georgian–Russian parentage. He was a member of the group of composers called The Five , who were dedicated to producing a specifically Russian kind of art music...
and Tchaikovsky
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский ; often "Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky" in English. His names are also transliterated "Piotr" or "Petr"; "Ilitsch", "Il'ich" or "Illyich"; and "Tschaikowski", "Tschaikowsky", "Chajkovskij"...
, but convinced, individual, finely constructed, and achieving a genuinely tragic and heroic expression that stands far above the pathos of his later music."
The premiere, which took place in St. Petersburg on March 28, 1897, was an absolute failure for reasons which included under-rehearsal and the poor performance of the conductor Alexander Glazunov
Alexander Glazunov
Alexander Konstantinovich Glazunov was a Russian composer of the late Russian Romantic period, music teacher and conductor...
. Rachmaninoff subsequently suffered a psychological collapse, but did not destroy or disavow the score, which was left in Russia when he went into exile in 1917 and subsequently lost. In 1944, after the composer's death, the separate instrumental parts of the symphony were discovered, and from these the full score was reconstructed. The symphony's second performance took place at the Moscow Conservatory
Moscow Conservatory
The Moscow Conservatory is a higher musical education institution in Moscow, and the second oldest conservatory in Russia after St. Petersburg Conservatory. Along with the St...
on October 17, 1945, conducted by Aleksandr Gauk
Aleksandr Gauk
Aleksandr Vassilievich Gauk was a Russian/Soviet conductor and composer.Aleksandr Gauk was born in Odessa in 1893. He recalled his first experience as hearing army bands and his mother singing and accompanying herself at the piano...
. Following a general reassessment of Rachmaninoff's music the First Symphony has been performed frequently, and has been recorded several times.
Background
The First Symphony was actually Rachmaninoff's second attempt in the genre. During 1890–91, his final year at the Moscow ConservatoryMoscow Conservatory
The Moscow Conservatory is a higher musical education institution in Moscow, and the second oldest conservatory in Russia after St. Petersburg Conservatory. Along with the St...
, he had been assigned by one of his composition teachers, Anton Arensky
Anton Arensky
Anton Stepanovich Arensky -Biography:Arensky was born in Novgorod, Russia. He was musically precocious and had composed a number of songs and piano pieces by the age of nine...
, to write a symphony as an exercise. Rachmaninoff later told biographer Oskar von Riesmann that he had completed the work; however, three of the four movements subsequently vanished. The single surviving movement, approximately 12 minutes in length, was published posthumously in 1947 as Rachmaninoff's Youth Symphony
Youth Symphony (Rachmaninoff)
The Youth Symphony in D minor is the first movement of a symphony written by Sergei Rachmaninoff, the score of which is dated September 28, 1891. It is the only movement of the work that has survived.The score was published posthumously by Muzgiz in 1947....
. This student work is written in traditional sonata form
Sonata form
Sonata form is a large-scale musical structure used widely since the middle of the 18th century . While it is typically used in the first movement of multi-movement pieces, it is sometimes used in subsequent movements as well—particularly the final movement...
and modeled after the opening movement of Tchaikovsky's Fourth Symphony
Symphony No. 4 (Tchaikovsky)
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 4 in F minor, Op. 36, was written between 1877 and 1878. The symphony's first performance was at a Russian Musical Society concert in Saint Petersburg on February 10 /February 22 1878, with Nikolai Rubinstein as conductor.- Form :The symphony is in four...
. Rachmaninoff added that neither Arensky nor fellow-professor Sergei Taneyev
Sergei Taneyev
Sergei Ivanovich Taneyev , was a Russian composer, pianist, teacher of composition, music theorist and author.-Life:...
were enthusiastic about the work, perhaps because of its lack of individuality. The First Piano Concerto
Piano Concerto No. 1 (Rachmaninoff)
Sergei Rachmaninoff composed his Piano Concerto No. 1 in F-sharp minor, Op. 1, in 1892, at age 19. He dedicated the work to Alexander Siloti. He revised the work thoroughly in 1917.-First version:...
, which he wrote later in 1891, showed a better indication of his ability to handle large-scale musical forces, and his transcription (1894) of Tchaikovsky's Manfred Symphony
Manfred Symphony
The Manfred Symphony in B minor, Op. 58, is a programmatic symphony composed by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky between May and September 1885. It is based on the poem "Manfred" written by Lord Byron in 1817...
into a piano duet gave him further exposure to the symphonic genre.
Composition
Rachmaninoff began planning what would become his First Symphony in September 1894, after he had finished orchestrating his Caprice Bohémien. He composed the symphony between January and October 1895, which was an unusually long time for Rachmaninoff to spend on a composition; the project had proved to be extremely challenging. Writing from IvanovkaIvanovka
Ivanovka is an estate near Tambov, Russia, which used to be the summer residence of the Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninoff in the period between 1890 and 1917 . It was the family home of his aristocratic relatives, the Satins. Many of Rachmaninoff's earlier masterpieces were created in its...
on July 29, he complained that despite seven-hour days, progress was exceptionally slow. Those daily work schedules had increased to ten hours a day by September, and the symphony was completed and orchestrated before Rachmaninoff left Ivanovka on October 7.
The atypical length of time Rachmaninoff had needed to compose the symphony was followed by delays in getting it performed. In 1895 he had met the musical philanthropist Mitrofan Belyayev
Mitrofan Belyayev
Mitrofan Petrovich Belyayev was a Russian music publisher, outstanding philanthropist, and the owner of a large wood dealership enterprise in Russia. He was also the founder of the Belyayev circle, a society of musicians in Russia whose members included Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Alexander Glazunov...
, whose interest in programming a piece of Rachmaninoff's music had led to a performance of the tone poem
Symphonic poem
A symphonic poem or tone poem is a piece of orchestral music in a single continuous section in which the content of a poem, a story or novel, a painting, a landscape or another source is illustrated or evoked. The term was first applied by Hungarian composer Franz Liszt to his 13 works in this vein...
The Rock
The Rock (Rachmaninoff)
The Rock, Op. 7 is a fantasia or symphonic poem for orchestra written by Sergei Rachmaninoff in the summer of 1893. It is dedicated to Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov.- Inspiration :...
at the Russian Symphony Concerts
Russian Symphony Concerts
The Russian Symphony Concerts were a series of Russian classical music concerts hosted by timber magnate and musical philanthropist Mitrofan Belyayev in St. Petersburg as a forum for young Russian composers to have their orchestral works performed...
in St. Petersburg. In 1896, encouraged by Taneyev and Glazunov, Belyayev agreed to program Rachmaninoff's symphony the following year. However, when Rachmaninoff played the symphony at the piano for Taneyev, the elder composer complained: "These melodies are flabby, colorless – there is nothing that can be done with them." Rachmaninoff made numerous changes to the score, but was still dissatisfied. After further advice from Taneyev he made further amendments, including expansion of the slow movement.
Description
The symphony is scored for 3 fluteFlute
The flute is a musical instrument of the woodwind family. Unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is an aerophone or reedless wind instrument that produces its sound from the flow of air across an opening...
s, 2 oboe
Oboe
The oboe is a double reed musical instrument of the woodwind family. In English, prior to 1770, the instrument was called "hautbois" , "hoboy", or "French hoboy". The spelling "oboe" was adopted into English ca...
s, 2 clarinet
Clarinet
The clarinet is a musical instrument of woodwind type. The name derives from adding the suffix -et to the Italian word clarino , as the first clarinets had a strident tone similar to that of a trumpet. The instrument has an approximately cylindrical bore, and uses a single reed...
s in B, 2 bassoon
Bassoon
The bassoon is a woodwind instrument in the double reed family that typically plays music written in the bass and tenor registers, and occasionally higher. Appearing in its modern form in the 19th century, the bassoon figures prominently in orchestral, concert band and chamber music literature...
s, 4 horn
Horn (instrument)
The horn is a brass instrument consisting of about of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. A musician who plays the horn is called a horn player ....
s in F, 3 trumpet
Trumpet
The trumpet is the musical instrument with the highest register in the brass family. Trumpets are among the oldest musical instruments, dating back to at least 1500 BCE. They are played by blowing air through closed lips, producing a "buzzing" sound which starts a standing wave vibration in the air...
s in B, 3 trombones, tuba
Tuba
The tuba is the largest and lowest-pitched brass instrument. Sound is produced by vibrating or "buzzing" the lips into a large cupped mouthpiece. It is one of the most recent additions to the modern symphony orchestra, first appearing in the mid-19th century, when it largely replaced the...
, timpani
Timpani
Timpani, or kettledrums, are musical instruments in the percussion family. A type of drum, they consist of a skin called a head stretched over a large bowl traditionally made of copper. They are played by striking the head with a specialized drum stick called a timpani stick or timpani mallet...
, cymbals, bass drum
Bass drum
Bass drums are percussion instruments that can vary in size and are used in several musical genres. Three major types of bass drums can be distinguished. The type usually seen or heard in orchestral, ensemble or concert band music is the orchestral, or concert bass drum . It is the largest drum of...
(movements 1, 2 and 4 only), triangle
Triangle
A triangle is one of the basic shapes of geometry: a polygon with three corners or vertices and three sides or edges which are line segments. A triangle with vertices A, B, and C is denoted ....
(movements 2 and 4 only), snare drum
Snare drum
The snare drum or side drum is a melodic percussion instrument with strands of snares made of curled metal wire, metal cable, plastic cable, or gut cords stretched across the drumhead, typically the bottom. Pipe and tabor and some military snare drums often have a second set of snares on the bottom...
, tambourine
Tambourine
The tambourine or marine is a musical instrument of the percussion family consisting of a frame, often of wood or plastic, with pairs of small metal jingles, called "zils". Classically the term tambourine denotes an instrument with a drumhead, though some variants may not have a head at all....
, tam-tam (movement 4 only) and strings
String instrument
A string instrument is a musical instrument that produces sound by means of vibrating strings. In the Hornbostel-Sachs scheme of musical instrument classification, used in organology, they are called chordophones...
. A typical performance has an approximate duration of 45 minutes.
Grave—Allegro non troppo
A short introduction (just seven bars), gives the tone to the work: gloomy, fierce, and solemn. In it two motivic items are presented which will establish the cyclicCyclic form
Cyclic form is a technique of musical construction, involving multiple sections or movements, in which a theme, melody, or thematic material occurs in more than one movement as a unifying device. Sometimes a theme may occur at the beginning and end Cyclic form is a technique of musical...
material for the entire composition: a note cell preceded by a grupetto and theme derived from the medieval Dies Irae
Dies Irae
Dies Irae is a thirteenth century Latin hymn thought to be written by Thomas of Celano . It is a medieval Latin poem characterized by its accentual stress and its rhymed lines. The metre is trochaic...
plainchant. The latter becomes the prevailing theme in the Allegro, developed and enriched by orchestral figures based on Tchaikovsky
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский ; often "Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky" in English. His names are also transliterated "Piotr" or "Petr"; "Ilitsch", "Il'ich" or "Illyich"; and "Tschaikowski", "Tschaikowsky", "Chajkovskij"...
. The second theme (Moderato), in the violins, is interesting in its melodic structure, which uses the gypsy scale
Gypsy scale
The term Gypsy scale, refers to one of several musical scales named after their association with Gypsy music.-Hungarian Gypsy scale:...
(with two augmented second
Augmented second
In classical music from Western culture, an augmented second is an interval produced by widening a major second by a chromatic semitone. For instance, the interval from C to D is a major second, two semitones wide, and both the intervals from C to D, and from C to D are augmented seconds, spanning...
s). This theme is repeated by the whole orchestra in a sudden and powerful fortissimo, which leads to the first theme climaxing in a brass chorale. At the beginning of the repetition, the cell-grupetto reappears insistently.
Allegro animato
The second movement is a fantastic scherzo which also begins with the cell-grupetto as well as a reminiscence of the Dies Irae, at least its first notes. The movement's main theme is a short melody, that we hear alternatively under its original form and its inversion, but the latter only appears briefly and episodically, spaced out by call signals and shudders of the orchestra which constitute an expressive background. In the central part, the cell-grupetto comes back again, giving birth to a new theme which is repeated by a solo violin for a few bars, in a gypsy air.Larghetto
In the lyric calm of this movement, even the grupetto seems to have lost its menacing tension. The clarinet sings an easy and soft melody, but in the middle some storms appear with the gloomy harmonies of the muted horns. The theme, repeated, is ornamented with repetitive appoggiatura and counterpointCounterpoint
In music, counterpoint is the relationship between two or more voices that are independent in contour and rhythm and are harmonically interdependent . It has been most commonly identified in classical music, developing strongly during the Renaissance and in much of the common practice period,...
.
Allegro con fuoco
The cell-grupetto again gives the final movement a faltering violence. The brass instruments and a march rhythmRhythm
Rhythm may be generally defined as a "movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions." This general meaning of regular recurrence or pattern in time may be applied to a wide variety of cyclical natural phenomena having a periodicity or...
start a theme based, once more, on the Dies Irae. A calm con anima passage follows with a melody in the violins which goes quickly to high notes. Brass instruments take a prominent role followed by a new change in the central part (Allegro mosso), introduced by repeated notes in the low strings. The rhythm is especially interesting, with its soft syncopation (related to a binary rhythm in a ternary bar): repeated accompaniment from the scherzo appears in the second part and the return of the grupetto relaunches the movement with its dynamic and orchestral violence. A tam-tam hit follows the coda, at the end of which the grupetto, played by the strings in a slower time, is repeated with a prophetic insistence, strengthened by the brass and percussion instruments.
Despite the uneven quality of the composition itself, there is no doubt that the First Symphony is powerful and dramatic. It is influenced by Tchaikovsky's last symphonies, although this influence can only be seen in the feeling of anguish against relentless fate.
Form
The composer Robert SimpsonRobert Simpson (composer)
Robert Simpson was an English composer and long-serving BBC producer and broadcaster.He is best known for his orchestral and chamber music , and for his writings on the music of Beethoven, Bruckner, Nielsen and Sibelius. He studied composition under Herbert Howells...
regarded Rachmaninoff's First Symphony as much superior to the two that followed it, feeling that it had been created "naturally and without strain" on the whole and with all four of its movements "thematically genuinely integrated." He also felt the symphony sidesteps what he called the "lyrical inflation" and "forced climaxes" of the Second Symphony
Symphony No. 2 (Rachmaninoff)
Symphony No. 2 in E minor, Op. 27 is a music piece by Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninoff, created in 1906–07. The premiere was conducted by the composer himself in St. Petersburg on 8 February 1908. Its duration is approximately 60 minutes when performed uncut; cut performances can be as...
and the piano concertos. Instead of this lyric inflation, as Robert Walker pointed out, a person could chart an increasing brevity and concision in Rachmaninoff's orchestral compositions in the works he completed after graduating from the Moscow Conservatory
Moscow Conservatory
The Moscow Conservatory is a higher musical education institution in Moscow, and the second oldest conservatory in Russia after St. Petersburg Conservatory. Along with the St...
—in other words, from Prince Rostislav to The Rock and from The Rock to the symphony. Simpson essentially agreed about this musical economy, commenting that the symphony's structure as a whole could not be faulted. While Rachmaninoff did have a habit of relaxing into a slower tempo with the second subject of his first movement (a habit at which, Simpson claimed, Rachmaninoff became much worse later in his career), he kept a firm grip on the corresponding material in this work. Simpson especially cited the last movement's climax as overwhelmingly powerful and extremely economical in the use of its musical material.
Motif (music)
In music, a motif or motive is a short musical idea, a salient recurring figure, musical fragment or succession of notes that has some special importance in or is characteristic of a composition....
relationships," adding that while the composer had employed this network in his Caprice Bohémien
Caprice Bohémien
Caprice Bohémien, Op. 12 is a symphonic poem for full orchestra composed by Sergei Rachmaninoff in 1892-1894. An earlier example of Rachmaninoff's compositions, the piece consists of many immense moments played in full a tutti, which was the same bombastic nature that critics would lambast with his...
, he takes its use still further in the symphony. The result is that, while the symphony is a fully cyclic
Cyclic form
Cyclic form is a technique of musical construction, involving multiple sections or movements, in which a theme, melody, or thematic material occurs in more than one movement as a unifying device. Sometimes a theme may occur at the beginning and end Cyclic form is a technique of musical...
work, the level of thematic integration is taken far more extensively than in most Russian symphonies. As musicologist Dr. David Brown points out, "Themes and thematic fragments from earlier movements are transformed
Thematic transformation
Thematic transformation is a technique of where a leitmotif, or theme, is developed by changing the theme by using Permutation , Augmentation, Diminution, and Fragmentation. It was primarily developed by Franz Liszt and his good friend Hector Berlioz...
, sometimes profoundly, to help shape existing material as well as to generate new material." In taking the level of thematic integration thus far, Rachmaninoff was able to use comparatively little musical material to combine all four movements. César Cui
César Cui
César Antonovich Cui was a Russian of French and Lithuanian descent. His profession was as an army officer and a teacher of fortifications; his avocational life has particular significance in the history of music, in that he was a composer and music critic; in this sideline he is known as a...
may have complained of exactly this quality when he wrote about the "meaningless repetition of the same short tricks," but motivic analysts who have since studied the symphony have considered these "tricks" a compositional strength, not a weakness.
Harrison writes that these same motivic analysts lay claim to the First Symphony as proof "that Rachmaninoff could write genuinely symphonic music rather than the ballets squeezed into sonata shapes written by many Russian composers, from Tchaikovsky to Stravinsky." Harrison adds that Rachmaninoff's treatment of symphonic form might for this reason be more closely descended from Alexander Borodin
Alexander Borodin
Alexander Porfiryevich Borodin was a Russian Romantic composer and chemist of Georgian–Russian parentage. He was a member of the group of composers called The Five , who were dedicated to producing a specifically Russian kind of art music...
, a point the St. Petersburg critics may have either failed to notice or ignored at the work's premiere. Another original idea of Rachmaninoff's, as pointed out by Harrison, was his "use of Znamenny Chants (знаменный распев) as the source of thematic ideas." While the material Rachmaninoff derives from them occasionally lends a decidedly religious air, he never quotes these chants literally. They resemble what Béla Bartók
Béla Bartók
Béla Viktor János Bartók was a Hungarian composer and pianist. He is considered one of the most important composers of the 20th century and is regarded, along with Liszt, as Hungary's greatest composer...
would call "imaginary folk music"—formally composed music that closely resembles folk music due to his complete absorption of the spirit and musical syntax of Eastern European folk song and dance.
Some analysts such as Rachmaninoff scholar Geoffrey Norris mention that the symphony also has its problems. The slow movement lapses into a static central episode referring back to the motto theme and the scherzo becomes depleted of rhythmic drive by ramblingly repeating repetitions the same theme. The symphony's clogged and sometimes brash orchestration can make the work sound portentous, though an attentive performance can make the symphony a dark, forceful and rapturous musical statement by helping clarify the orchestration and minimize the potential pitfalls in that area."
Glazunov
Nikolai Rimsky-KorsakovNikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
Nikolai Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov was a Russian composer, and a member of the group of composers known as The Five.The Five, also known as The Mighty Handful or The Mighty Coterie, refers to a circle of composers who met in Saint Petersburg, Russia, in the years 1856–1870: Mily Balakirev , César...
, whose own musical preferences in the later years of his career were not overly progressive, may have sounded an advance warning on hearing the symphony in rehearsal when he told Rachmaninoff, "Forgive me, but I do not find this music at all agreeable." As the elder statesman of Russian music after Tchaikovsky's death, Rimsky-Korsakov may have felt justified saying something to Rachmaninoff, but he may have said it for the wrong reason. By the reports of many present, the rehearsal that Rimsky-Korsakov had heard, conducted by his friend and musical protégé Glazunov, was both a disaster as a performance and a horrific travesty of the score.
Though Glazunov loved to conduct, he never totally mastered the craft, despite Rimsky-Korsakov's claims in his memoirs to the contrary. The elder composer's comments on Glazunov's initial appearances as a conductor may in fact have been accurate for this occasion as well: "Slow by nature, maladroit and clumsy of movement, the maestro, speaking slowly and in a low voice, manifestly displayed little ability either for conducting rehearsals or for swaying the orchestra during concert performances." Not only did Glazunov conduct badly during the rehearsal of the First Symphony, but he also made cuts in the score and several changes in orchestration. The cuts he made in the first two movements made little sense musically, and his poor use of rehearsal time was complicated by the fact that two other works were receiving their first performances at the same concert. Harrison mentions that Rachmaninoff was concerned and tried talking to him during breaks in the rehearsal but to no effect.
Glazunov premiered the symphony on March 28 (March 16 o.s.), 1897. The performance was a complete failure; Rachmaninoff himself left in agony before it was over. Conductor Alexander Khessin, who attended the premiere, remembered, "The Symphony was insufficiently rehearsed, the orchestra was ragged, basic stability in tempos was lacking, many errors in the orchestral parts were uncorrected; but the chief thing that ruined the work was the lifeless, superficial, bland performance, with no flashes of animation, enthusiasm or brilliance of orchestral sound."
Moreover, Natalia Satina, who would become Rachmaninoff's wife, would later claim, along with other witnesses, that Glazunov may have been drunk on the podium. One person in particular wrote that at the rehearsal he was "standing motionless on the conductor's rostrum, wielding his baton without animation." Rachmaninoff was obviously very concerned and in the pauses went to Glazunov and said something to him, but he never managed to arouse him from a state of complete indifference. Although Rachmaninoff never echoed this claim of inebriation and the charge itself cannot be confirmed, it is also not implausible considering Glazunov's reputation for alcohol. As reportedly told later by his pupil Dmitri Shostakovich
Dmitri Shostakovich
Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich was a Soviet Russian composer and one of the most celebrated composers of the 20th century....
and echoed in the New Grove, Glazunov kept a bottle of alcohol hidden behind his desk at the St. Petersburg Conservatory, sipping it through a tube during lessons.
Drunk or not, Glazunov may have neither understood nor been totally committed to the symphony, as it was a composition in a newer, more modern idiom and greater length (approximately 45 minutes) than he might have expected. Nor was he apparently sympathetic to Rachmaninoff's music on the whole, commenting on another occasion, "There is a lot of feeling ... but no sense whatever." What makes this comment strange in itself is that Glazunov himself may have anticipated Rachmaninoff's musical style in his own Second Symphony, which he had written in 1886. (Glazunov later demonstrated his low regard for Rachmaninoff's music by leaving a copy of the score for the Fourth Piano Concerto
Piano Concerto No. 4 (Rachmaninoff)
Piano Concerto No. 4 in G minor, Op. 40 is a music piece by Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninoff, completed in 1926. The work currently exists in three versions. Following its unsuccessful premiere he made cuts and other amendments before publishing it in 1928. With continued lack of success, he...
in a Paris taxicab in 1930. The score had been a present from the composer.) Nevertheless, it might be surprising that Glazunov had conducted a competent performance of Rachmaninoff's orchestral fantasy The Rock the previous year. While it was generally received favorably, César Cui
César Cui
César Antonovich Cui was a Russian of French and Lithuanian descent. His profession was as an army officer and a teacher of fortifications; his avocational life has particular significance in the history of music, in that he was a composer and music critic; in this sideline he is known as a...
stated, in a foretaste of his comments on the symphony, that "the whole composition shows that this composer is more concerned about sound than about music."
Political bias
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
did not necessarily bode well, with Rimsky-Korsakov's comment merely serving as an omen of things to come. The St. Petersburg musical scene was dominated by a group of young composers called the Belyayev circle
Belyayev circle
The Belyayev circle was a society of Russian musicians who met in St. Petersburg, Russia between 1885 and 1908, and whose members included Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Alexander Glazunov, Vladimir Stasov, Anatoly Lyadov, Alexander Ossovsky, Witold Maliszewski, Nikolai Tcherepnin, Nikolay Sokolov among...
, headed by Rimsky-Korsakov since he had taught many of them at the Conservatory there. While Rimsky-Korsakov called the group "progressive" in his autobiography, musicologist Francis Maes suggests a better term for the group's focus might have been "moderately academic" as the majority of these composers turned technical accomplishment into an end in itself. This attitude, claims musicologist Solomon Volkov
Solomon Volkov
Solomon Moiseyevich Volkov is a Russian journalist and musicologist. He is best known for Testimony, which was published in 1979 following his emigration from the Soviet Union in 1976...
, had long typified the St. Petersburg Conservatory and the majority of its alumni.
The academic style of musical composition which resulted from this attitude, typified best in the works of Glazunov and Rimsky-Korsakov, became the preferred method of this group. If a composer wanted to be accepted into the Belyayev circle or receive Belyayev's patronage, he had to conform by writing musical works in this vein. This bias would continue to some point after Rimsky-Korsakov's departure with his son-in-law Maximilian Steinberg
Maximilian Steinberg
Maximilian Osseyevich Steinberg was a Russian composer of classical music born in what is now Lithuania.-Life:...
in charge of composition classes at the Conservatory through the 1920s, and Shostakovich would complain about Steinberg's conservatism, typified by such phrases as "the inviolable foundations of the kuchka
The Five
The Five, also known as The Mighty Handful or The Mighty Coterie , refers to a circle of composers who met in Saint Petersburg, Russia, in the years 1856–1870: Mily Balakirev , César Cui, Modest Mussorgsky, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and Alexander Borodin...
" and the "sacred traditions of Nikolai Andreyevich [Rimsky-Korsakov]." Despite Rimsky-Korsakov's denial of the Belyayev circle being similar to The Five
The Five
The Five, also known as The Mighty Handful or The Mighty Coterie , refers to a circle of composers who met in Saint Petersburg, Russia, in the years 1856–1870: Mily Balakirev , César Cui, Modest Mussorgsky, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and Alexander Borodin...
under Mily Balakirev
Mily Balakirev
Mily Alexeyevich Balakirev ,Russia was still using old style dates in the 19th century, and information sources used in the article sometimes report dates as old style rather than new style. Dates in the article are taken verbatim from the source and therefore are in the same style as the source...
, the two factions did share one trait. Like The Five, the Belyayev group viewed with suspicion those compositions that did not follow its canon.
Critical reaction
Much of what was written about the symphony may have been motivated by a long-standing antagonism between St. Petersburg and Moscow. There was also the fact it was a symphony in question this time—a musical form the St. Petersburg critics and many other members of the Belyayev Circle were very particular about defending. While critics in St. Petersburg had actually given good reviews to The Rock when Glazunov conducted it, a symphony was another matter.Rachmaninoff's work may have been considered offensive because of its relatively progressive use of symphonic form; this could have gone against the critics' sensibilities as well as the precepts Rimsky-Korsakov taught at the Conservatory. Aleksandr Gauk
Aleksandr Gauk
Aleksandr Vassilievich Gauk was a Russian/Soviet conductor and composer.Aleksandr Gauk was born in Odessa in 1893. He recalled his first experience as hearing army bands and his mother singing and accompanying herself at the piano...
, who would conduct the triumphant revival of the symphony in 1945, surmised as much, suggesting the work failed initially "because it was a modern composition, far ahead of its time, so it did not satisfy the tastes of the contemporary critics." The more partisan of these critics went on the attack, with Cui leading the charge:
Cui did give Rachmaninoff as close to a compliment as he would ever come, writing, "Mr. Rachmaninoff does avoid banality, and probably feels strongly and deeply, and tries to express these feelings in new forms." However, this olive branch was too obscured by the vitriol of the rest of the review for anyone to notice. Moreover, Cui's bias against Moscow composers was extremely deep-seated. In a letter to M.S. Kerzina dated December 19, 1904, he placed them together with Richard Strauss
Richard Strauss
Richard Georg Strauss was a leading German composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras. He is known for his operas, which include Der Rosenkavalier and Salome; his Lieder, especially his Four Last Songs; and his tone poems and orchestral works, such as Death and Transfiguration, Till...
, "whose absurd cacophony will not be music even in the 30th century."
A more balanced consideration of the work, unfortunately too late to undo the damage wrought by Cui, came from critic Nikolai Findeisen in the April issue of Russkaya Muzykalnaya Gazeta:
Composer's reaction
Rachmaninoff wrote to composer Alexander Zatayevich on May 6 "of my impressions of the performance of the symphony ... though it is difficult for me.". This letter has been cited frequently for the composer's opinion of Glazunov's lack of conducting skill. However, Rachmaninoff also writes extensively about his impression of the symphony itself:Long after the fact, Rachmaninoff told his biographer Oskar von Riesemann, "I returned to Moscow a changed man. My confidence in myself had received a sudden blow. Agonizing hours spent in doubt and hard thinking had brought me to the conclusion that I ought to give up composing." However, the composer's comments to Zatayevich seem considerably more rational, even logical. Nor had the press been entirely unfavorable toward the symphony (see above). It may have been on subsequent reflection that Rachmaninoff suffered his psychological collapse.
As Harrison points out, "This delay in Rachmaninoff's collapse has never been, and presumably never will be, satisfactorily explained." One question some scholars have asked is whether the symphony had an autobiographical element that gave its failure a more personal dimension. According to many sources, the original manuscript, now lost, carried a dedication to "A. L." plus the epigraph to Leo Tolstoy
Leo Tolstoy
Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy was a Russian writer who primarily wrote novels and short stories. Later in life, he also wrote plays and essays. His two most famous works, the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina, are acknowledged as two of the greatest novels of all time and a pinnacle of realist...
's novel Anna Karenina
Anna Karenina
Anna Karenina is a novel by the Russian writer Leo Tolstoy, published in serial installments from 1873 to 1877 in the periodical The Russian Messenger...
, "Vengeance is mine; I will repay." A. L. was Anna Lodyzhenskaya, the beautiful Gypsy wife of his friend Peter Lodyzhensky. He had also dedicated the Caprice Bohémien to her. Whether Rachmaninoff's regard for her was merely infatuation or something more serious cannot be known. Neither can the connection between the two of them and Anna Karenina, or between the biblical quotation and the religious chants providing the basis for the symphony's thematic material.
When the collapse came, Rachmaninoff was left totally shattered. He had begun sketches for another symphony but now abandoned them and was unable to compose until 1899, when family members and friends convinced him to seek hypnotic therapy
Hypnotherapy
Hypnotherapy is a therapy that is undertaken with a subject in hypnosis.The word "hypnosis" is an abbreviation of James Braid's term "neuro-hypnotism", meaning "sleep of the nervous system"....
with Dr. Nikolai Dahl
Nikolai Dahl
Nikolai Vladimirovich Dahl, often called Nicolai Dahl was a Russian physician. He graduated from the Moscow University in 1887, and was a studied in France with Charcot who initiated a therapy by hypnotizing his patients. Dahl had a private practice in Moscow. His speciality was in the fields of...
. The product of these meetings was the Second Piano Concerto
Piano Concerto No. 2 (Rachmaninoff)
The Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor, Op. 18, is a concerto for piano and orchestra composed by Sergei Rachmaninoff between the autumn of 1900 and April 1901. The second and third movements were first performed with the composer as soloist on 2 December 1900...
, premiered in 1900. But during this period he focused on conducting and performing, so the time was not lost at all. One stroke of good fortune came from impresario Savva Mamontov
Savva Mamontov
Savva Ivanovich Mamontov was a famous Russian industrialist, merchant, entrepreneur, and patron of the arts.-Biography:He was a son of the wealthy merchant and industrialist Ivan Feodorovich Mamontov and Maria Tikhonovna . In 1841 the family moved to Moscow. From 1852 he studied in St...
, who two years earlier had founded the Moscow Private Russian Opera Company. He offered Rachmaninoff the post of assistant conductor for the 1897-8 season, which the composer accepted. He also acted as a soloist in many concerts.
Neglect and disappearance
The symphony was not performed again in Rachmaninoff's lifetime. Although it is sometimes said that he tore the score up, he did not in fact do that; but he remained ambivalent about it. In April 1908, three months after the successful premiere of his Second SymphonySymphony No. 2 (Rachmaninoff)
Symphony No. 2 in E minor, Op. 27 is a music piece by Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninoff, created in 1906–07. The premiere was conducted by the composer himself in St. Petersburg on 8 February 1908. Its duration is approximately 60 minutes when performed uncut; cut performances can be as...
, he considered revising the First. He wrote his Conservatory colleague Nikita Morozov that the symphony was one of three of his early works that he would like to see in a "corrected, decent form." (The other two compositions were the First Piano Concerto and Caprice Bohémien.) He wrote in 1910 to critic Grigory Prokofiev, "The symphony contains many successful passages insofar as its music is concerned, but the orchestration is worse than weak, a fact that caused its failure at the St. Petersburg performance." In 1917, in a letter to Boris Asafiev
Boris Asafiev
Boris Vladimirovich Asafyev was a Russian and Soviet composer, writer, musicologist, musical critic and one of founders of Soviet musicology.Asafyev had a strong influence on Soviet music. His compositions include ballets, operas, symphonies, concertos and chamber music...
, he wrote that he would not show it to anyone and make sure in his will that no one would see it.
Before his departure from Russia, Rachmaninoff gave the key to his writing desk in his Moscow flat to his cousin Sofiya Satin; in it was locked the manuscript score for the First Symphony. He showed her the manuscript and asked her to look after it for him. Satina had the desk moved to her own flat, in the same building. It remained there until Satina emigrated from Russia in 1921. At that time, the manuscript passed into the care of the family housekeeper, Mariya Shatalina (née Ivanova). Shatalina died in 1925. All other manuscripts from Rachmaninoff's flat were moved by the state to archives of the Glinka Museum in Moscow, including the manuscript of the two-piano version of the symphony as well as some sketches for the work, but the manuscript score disappeared. The mysterious disappearance of the score has suggested to some that it may have been appropriated by an opportunist. Regardless of the exact circumstances, the manuscript score remains lost.
Second life
While Rachmaninoff had kept the score of the First Symphony safely in his Moscow flat until the October RevolutionOctober Revolution
The October Revolution , also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution , Red October, the October Uprising or the Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution of 1917...
, he had made no attempt to collect the orchestral parts in his haste to leave St. Petersburg in 1897. This fact would prove fortuitous in the symphony's ultimate fate. Shortly after the composer's death, in 1944, the instrumental parts of the symphony were discovered by chance in the Belyayev Archive of the Leningrad Conservatory Library. Using these parts and the two-piano arrangement, a group of scholars headed by prominent Russian conductor Aleksandr Gauk
Aleksandr Gauk
Aleksandr Vassilievich Gauk was a Russian/Soviet conductor and composer.Aleksandr Gauk was born in Odessa in 1893. He recalled his first experience as hearing army bands and his mother singing and accompanying herself at the piano...
reconstructed the full score. The second performance of the piece, considered a success, took place at the Moscow Conservatory
Moscow Conservatory
The Moscow Conservatory is a higher musical education institution in Moscow, and the second oldest conservatory in Russia after St. Petersburg Conservatory. Along with the St...
on October 17, 1945, conducted by Aleksandr Gauk.
The American premiere took place on March 19, 1948 at the Philadelphia Academy of Music
Academy of Music (Philadelphia)
The Academy of Music, also known as American Academy of Music, is a concert hall and opera house located at Broad and Locust Streets in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was built in 1857 and is the oldest opera house in the United States that is still used for its original purpose...
, the Philadelphia Orchestra
Philadelphia Orchestra
The Philadelphia Orchestra is a symphony orchestra based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the United States. One of the "Big Five" American orchestras, it was founded in 1900...
conducted by Eugene Ormandy
Eugene Ormandy
Eugene Ormandy was a Hungarian-born conductor and violinist.-Early life:Born Jenő Blau in Budapest, Hungary, Ormandy began studying violin at the Royal National Hungarian Academy of Music at the age of five...
. It was part of the first concert to be televised in the United States. A second performance was broadcast on radio the following day. Worth noting in light of the 1897 premiere is that seven rehearsals were needed to prepare the work for its initial American hearing, even though both Ormandy and the Philadelphia had long been familiar with the composer's style. With the posthumous rise in Rachmaninoff's reputation as a composer, the symphony became part of the standard orchestral repertoire.
Conversely, the first British performance of the symphony did not take place until January 2, 1964, with the semi-professional Polyphonia Symphony Orchestra conducted by Bryan Fairfax
Bryan Fairfax
Bryan Fairfax is a retired Australian conductor based in the United Kingdom, who is known for his championing of little known or neglected works....
. This was during a time when Rachmaninoff's music was held in low regard in the United Kingdom.
Notable recordings
- Vladimir AshkenazyVladimir AshkenazyVladimir Davidovich Ashkenazy is a Russian-Icelandic conductor and pianist. Since 1972 he has been a citizen of Iceland, his wife Þórunn's country of birth. Since 1978, because of his many obligations in Europe, he and his family have resided in Meggen, near Lucerne in Switzerland...
conducting the Concertgebouw Orchestra - Andre PrevinAndré PrevinAndré George Previn, KBE is an American pianist, conductor, and composer. He is considered one of the most versatile musicians in the world, and is the winner of four Academy Awards for his film work and ten Grammy Awards for his recordings. -Early Life:Previn was born in...
conducting the London Symphony OrchestraLondon Symphony OrchestraThe London Symphony Orchestra is a major orchestra of the United Kingdom, as well as one of the best-known orchestras in the world. Since 1982, the LSO has been based in London's Barbican Centre.-History:... - Mariss JansonsMariss JansonsMariss Ivars Georgs Jansons is a Latvian conductor, the son of conductor Arvīds Jansons. His mother, the singer Iraida Jansons, who was Jewish, gave birth to him in hiding in Riga, Latvia, after her father and brother were killed in the Riga Ghetto...
conducting the St. Petersburg Philharmonic OrchestraSt. Petersburg Philharmonic OrchestraThe Saint Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra was formed in 1882 and is Russia's oldest symphony orchestra.It was initially known as the "Imperial Music Choir" and performed privately for the court of Alexander III of Russia. By the 1900s it had started to give public performances at the... - Gianandrea NosedaGianandrea NosedaGianandrea Noseda is an Italian conductor. He studied piano, composition and conducting in Milan. He furthered his conducting studies with Donato Renzetti, Myung-Whun Chung and Valery Gergiev....
conducting the BBC PhilharmonicBBC PhilharmonicThe BBC Philharmonic is a British broadcasting symphony orchestra based at Media City UK, Salford, England. It is one of five radio orchestras maintained by the British Broadcasting Corporation. The orchestra's primary concert venue is the Bridgewater Hall.... - Eugene OrmandyEugene OrmandyEugene Ormandy was a Hungarian-born conductor and violinist.-Early life:Born Jenő Blau in Budapest, Hungary, Ormandy began studying violin at the Royal National Hungarian Academy of Music at the age of five...
conducting the Philadelphia OrchestraPhiladelphia OrchestraThe Philadelphia Orchestra is a symphony orchestra based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the United States. One of the "Big Five" American orchestras, it was founded in 1900... - Mikhail PletnevMikhail PletnevMikhail Vasilievich Pletnev is a Russian pianist, conductor, and composer.-Life and career:Pletnev was born into a very musical family in Arkhangelsk, then part of the Soviet Union; his father played and taught the bayan, and his mother the piano...
conducting the Russian National OrchestraRussian National OrchestraThe Russian National Orchestra premiered in Moscow in 1990.It was the first Russian orchestra to perform at the Apostolic Palace, Vatican and in Israel.... - Leonard SlatkinLeonard SlatkinLeonard Edward Slatkin is an American conductor and composer.-Early life and education:Slatkin was born in Los Angeles to a musical family that came from areas of the Russian Empire now in Ukraine. His father Felix Slatkin was the violinist, conductor and founder of the Hollywood String Quartet,...
conducting the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra - Yevgeny Svetlanov conducting the Bolshoi Theatre Orchestra, another with the USSR Symphony Orchestra
- Edo de WaartEdo de WaartEdo de Waart is a Dutch conductor, and the Music Director of both the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra and the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra....
conducting the Rotterdam Philharmonic, another recording with Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra - Walter WellerWalter WellerWalter Weller is an Austrian conductor and violinist.-Biography:Weller was born in Vienna, Austria where he first gained renown as a prodigy on the violin...
conducting the Suisse Romande Orchestra
Sources
- Bertensson, Sergei and Jay Leyda, with the assistance of Sophia Satina, Sergei Rachmaninoff—A Lifetime in Music (Washington Square, New York: New York University Press, 1956)). ISBN n/a.
- Fay, Laurel, Shostakovich: A Life (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2000). ISBN 0-19-518251-0.
- Harrison, Max, Rachmaninoff: Life, Works, Recordings (London and New York: Continnum, 2005). ISBN 0-8264-5344-9.
- Maes, Francis, tr. Pomerans, Arnold J. and Erica Pomerans, A History of Russian Music: From Kamarinskaya to Babi Yar (Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of California Press, 2002). ISBN 0-520-21815-9.
- Martyn, Barrie, Rachmaninoff: Composer, Pianist, Conductor (Aldershot, England: Scolar Press, 1990). ISBN 0-85967-809-1.
- Norris, Gregory, Rachmaninoff (New York: Schirmer Books, 1993). ISBN 0-02-870685-4.
- Norris, Gregory, ed. Stanley Sadie, The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (London: MacMillian, 1980), 20 vols. ISBN 0-333-23111-2.
- Rimsky-Korsakof, Nicolai, tr. J. A. Joffe, My Musical Life (London: Faber, 1989) ISBN 0-8443-0024-1.
- Schwarz, Boris, ed. Stanley Sadie, "Glazunov, Alexander Konstantinovich," The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (London: Macmillian, 1980), 20 vols. ISBN 0-333-23111-2.
- Simpson, RobertRobert Simpson (composer)Robert Simpson was an English composer and long-serving BBC producer and broadcaster.He is best known for his orchestral and chamber music , and for his writings on the music of Beethoven, Bruckner, Nielsen and Sibelius. He studied composition under Herbert Howells...
, ed. Robert Simpson, The Symphony: Volume 2, Mahler to the Present Day (New York: Drake Publishers, Inc., 1972). ISBN 87749-245-X. - Steinberg, MichaelMichael Steinberg (music critic)Michael Steinberg was an American music critic, musicologist, and writer. Born in Breslau, Germany , Steinberg left Germany as one of the Kindertransport child refugees...
, The Concerto (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1998). ISBN 0-19-510330-0. - Tranchefort, François René, Guía de la música sinfónica (Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 1989). ISBN 84-206-5232-6.
- Volkov, Solomon, tr. Bouis, Antonina W., St. Petersburg: A Cultural History (New York: The Free Press, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc., 1995). ISBN 0-02-874052-1.
- Walker, Robert, Rachmaninoff (London and New York: Omnibus Press, 1980). ISBN 0-89524-208-7.
- Wilson, Elizabeth, Shostakovich: A Life Remembered, Second Edition (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1994, 2006). ISBN 0-691-12886-3.
- Wooldridge, David, Conductor's World (London: Barrie and Rackliff, 1970) ISBN 0-214-66733-2.
- Yasser, Joseph, Progressive tendencies in Rachmaninoff's music (Tempo (New Ser.), Winter, 1951-2)
External links
- Program notes
- classic.chubrik.ru/ Audio archives in MP3MP3MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III, more commonly referred to as MP3, is a patented digital audio encoding format using a form of lossy data compression...
format