Makayla Lane singing Lascia ch’io pianga
Sam Hollister is the artistic director of Aurora. Read his program notes for the latest concert below. You can also watch the videos from the concert at this link!
Lascia ch’io pianga (George Frideric Handel)
Handel’s famous aria from the opera Rinaldo is, perhaps, more storied than practically any other aria from the operatic repertoire. The ubiquitous melody wound its way into no fewer than three of his vocal works: Almira (1705), an opera featuring the melody as a sarabande; Il trionfo del Tempo e della Verità (1707-1737), an oratorio featuring the melody in aria form, but slightly more optimistic; and, most famously, Rinaldo (1711), in which the melody is formulated into a full and lamenting aria. This version is what we will perform today.
The present arrangement, for flute, violin, clarinet, piano, and voice, is not too distant from what might have been imagined in the original, unspecified instrumentation. Handel’s original scoring was for voice and figured-bass accompaniment, enabling the aria to be easily embedded in a variety of musical contexts (as it ultimately was).
Cinq Petits Duos for flute, violin, and piano (César Cui)
It might not be obvious from the sound of this suite, but César Cui dedicated this suite of parlor trinkets to Grand Duke Mikhail Alexandrovich and Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna of Russia in 1897. Despite his French-styled name and suite title, César Cui was actually Цезарь Антонович Кюи, member of Russia’s “Mighty Handful,” also known as “The Five.” These five Russian composers, also including Balakirev, Mussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Borodin, were a composer’s alliance operating from 1856 to 1870. Their mission was to create a distinctly Russian sound in the classical repertoire, with condescension thrown to the traditional formalists, such as Mozart and Bach, and praise granted to the brooders, Glinka and Berlioz. It is all the more surprising that, in light of this lifelong mission, Cui would return to this very relaxed parlor style in the later year of 1897. It seems as though here, in the chamber setting, he found respite from the exhausting labor of reinventing a musical culture, which he attempted in his massive and mighty operas.
Suite for Violin, Clarinet, and Piano (Darius Milhaud)
Whereas Cui was a member of “The Five,” Milhaud, funnily enough, was a member of “Les Six,” the Russians’ French counterpart. The latter group even took their inspiration from the Russian group. In Milhaud’s account of the group’s origination, he comments that the collection of composers was not entirely logical. He remarks that “Auric and Poulenc followed ideas of Cocteau, Honegger followed German Romanticism, and myself, Mediterranean lyricism!”
Mediterranean influence, indeed—but much more. Several years prior to composing this sprightly suite, Milhaud served as secretary to Paul Claudel, the French ambassador to Brazil. During this period in South America (1917-1919), Milhaud was immersed in Brazilian musical styles. Ultimately, he brought these styles to his compositional voice in works such as Le boeuf sur le toit (1920), and, further down the road, the present suite. In particular, listen for the Latin-inspired rhythms in the first movement, the incessant dance rhythm of the third movement, and the delightfully simple, parlor-tune folk song that closes the suite.
Tarantelle (Camille Saint-Saëns)
The standard tarantella lore says that, if you are bitten by a tarantula and begin to convulse, the best remedy is to be egged on by furious dance music in lockstep until you have danced out the demon, or poison, as it were. In reality, the story is not directly connected to the musical phenomenon. The musical genre of the tarantella originated as a means to quell “dancing mania,” a puzzling European phenomenon from the 14th through 17th centuries that was not certifiably connected to tarantula bites. Saint-Saëns’ rhythmic and incessant version of the dance leaves no confusion about the mania and frenzy that this lore suggests.
Written when Saint-Saëns was just 22 years old, the work brought the new composer a wave of recognition. At the time, the popular operatic composer Rossini introduced the work to a group of his fanatic admirers as his own work. Naturally, his supporters went nuts over the brilliance and vivacity of the composition. Casually, Rossini revealed that the composition was really Camille’s—and all were shocked and impressed by this stranger. Saint-Saëns later attributed much of his success to this “generous” gimmick by Rossini.