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On May 25, 1919, in Bucharest, the first performance of George Enescu's Third Symphony took place.
George Enescu - Symphony No. 3 (1916)
Conducted by Gennady Rozhdestvensky with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra. I. Moderato - Un Poco Maest...
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I would like to remember the good Aldo Clementi, who passed away a couple of years ago
Aldo Clementi: Two canons for flute in G, violin and piano (1994)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xA63xTWZM5I
Aldo Clementi (1925): Due canoni (1994) for flute in G, violin and piano.
Live recording: Venice, Ateneo Veneto, Sunday 23 October 2005.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XUm-A2ygfBk
Aldo Clementi: Informel III for orchestra (1961 - 1963)
Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana
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...since they are there
On May 26, 1914, in Paris, the first performance of Le Rossignol by Igor Stravinsky took place.
Natalie Dessay: "Le Rossignol" (Part I)
http://youtu.be/bkEkm40N6sI
Here is the film "Le Rossignol" by Stravinsky with French subtitles. The performers from the original recording are presented in their respective roles. The
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On May 26, 1799, Alexander Pushkin was born in Moscow, the founder of great Russian literature. He was not a composer nor a musician but, I believe he must find hospitality in any musical diary that respects itself; not so much because he loved music so much – Mozart and Rossini in particular – but because, not only were over 3000 songs set to music based on his poems, but above all because Russian musical theater owed much to him in the composition of many of its masterpieces.
Glinka's “Ruslan and Lyudmila,” Dargomyzhsky's “Rusalka,” Rimsky-Korsakov's “The Tale of Tsar Saltan,” Tchaikovsky's “Eugene Onegin” and “The Queen of Spades,” Rachmaninoff's “Aleko,” Stravinsky's “Mavra,” to which one must add three librettos that were directly set to music just as Pushkin conceived them: Dargomyzhsky's “The Stone Guest,” Rimsky-Korsakov's “Mozart and Salieri,” and Rachmaninoff's “The Miserly Knight.”
It is true, I forgot Mussorgsky's “Boris Godunov,” and the reason is dictated by the fact that I consider this opera "wonderfully unbalanced" like the drama from which it derives, the most beautiful opera – along with Wagner's Tristan und Isolde – that has ever been composed.
The history of the composition of this masterpiece is among the most tormented and controversial, a fate that unfortunately affected almost all of Mussorgsky's music for two fundamental reasons. The first was his psychological state, which heavily conditioned his work: he was often under the influence of alcohol, and this caused many works to remain unfinished. The second was because his way of composing was very avant-garde and, the political message attached to his works was not tolerated at all by the Tsarist power, thus attracting the wrath of censorship and the criticism of his colleagues, starting with Rimsky-Korsakov.
The plot vigorously represents the psychological drama of Tsar Boris who, elected after having had the legitimate heir Dmitry assassinated, is in turn persecuted by a false Dmitry, who drives him to madness first and then to death. The false Dmitry is Grigory, a novice monk who is informed by the prior monk Pimen of the story of Boris and Dmitry, who, if he were still alive, would be the same age as Grigory. From this comes the decision of these two to impersonate Dmitry.
The two characters – Boris and the false Dmitry - are both perfectly aware of the duplicity of their attitude, and are analyzed in every fold of their soul with ruthless accuracy. Mussorgsky, however, expands the philosophical-political message of the tragedy. If, indeed, the psychological element remains masterful in Mussorgsky, then besides the presence of the people around whom the opera revolves, human understanding in observing Boris's madness is central. He significantly reduced the number of characters compared to Pushkin, gave more breath to the crowd scenes, and gave a completely new importance to the Innocent, a character who in Pushkin is barely mentioned but who, in the opera, acquires a determining function. It is he who unmasks the illusion of freedom, opening the eyes of the people who had nurtured feelings toward the false Dmitry elected as Tsar.
This way of representing history, this harsh and explicit criticism of Tsarist power, caused the opera to immediately disappear from theaters. It was only after Mussorgsky's death in 1881 that Rimsky-Korsakov revived it by re-orchestrating it by hand and making variations on the original theatrical text, thus making it acceptable to the ears and eyes of the Tsarist power.
One of the most striking examples of these transformations lies in the opera's finale, where Korsakov reversed the order of the last two scenes. In the Mussorgskian version, first there is the scene of Boris's death, then the scene that concludes with the beautiful and heartbreaking aria of accusation by the Innocent against power. In Rimsky's version, it is exactly the opposite. Apparently, it may seem the same and insignificant. But just as in mathematical addition, reversing the order of the addends does not change the result, so it is not for theater. By ending in the original manner, the final message is clearly an indictment of power; by ending in the second version, however, the message is one of a triumph of the established power. In this regard, and precisely to make clearer what I mean, I want to quote what the Innocent sings in the finale of “Boris Godunov” in the Mussorgskian version:
Flow, flow, bitter tears,
weep, weep, orthodox soul!
The enemy will soon arrive and there will be darkness,
dark, impenetrable darkness. Sorrow, sorrow upon Russia,
Weep, weep, Russian people,
famished people!
Every time I write this heartbreaking phrase, I cannot help but think of what, unfortunately,
it happened later, in the twentieth century, to this tormented people.
I also like to quote a poem by Pushkin that I love very much:
In the depths of Siberian mines
Keep proud patience,
Your sufferings shall not be in vain
Nor the high flight of thoughts
Faithful sister of misfortune
Hope will awaken
In the dark underground, strength and joy,
The longed-for hour will come.
To you, love and friendship will come
Passing through the gloomy locks,
As to your prison dens
My voice will arrive free.
The heavy shackles will fall, the prisons
Will crumble – and freedom
Will welcome you joyfully at the door,
The brothers will give you back the swords.
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On May 27, 1906, in Essen, Gustav Mahler conducted the first performance of his Sixth Symphony.
Mahler: Symphony No.6 - Haitink/CSO(2008Live)
http://youtu.be/Zvfh_mjPLlQ
Gustav Mahler (1860-1911) Symphony No.6 in A minor "Tragische" Bernard Haitink Chicago Symphony Orch...
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May 27, 2003 - May 27, 2013: 10 years since the passing of Luciano Berio
https://www.youtube.com/results?q=berio&biw=1404&bih=717&ie=UTF-8&gl=IT&sa=N&tab=i1
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Yeah... today radio3 fortunately remembered it. W radio3!
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Giovanni Legrenzi
(Clusone, August 12, 1626 - Venice, May 27, 1690)
If I like it, it always moves me every time I listen to it!
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Niccolò Paganini
(Genoa, 27 October 1782 - Nice, 27 May 1840)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=717sMsiAWIk
It was the first Paganini violin concerto I ever heard and it is still my favorite!
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May 27, 1878, Monday
Antonín Dvořák finishes the score of the Sextet for strings op.48 in A major for 2 violins, 2 violas, 2 cellos in Prague
I love this composer very much; in Prague I visited his house and his grave.
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Luciano Berio
(Imperia, October 24, 1925 - Rome, May 27, 2003)
I have no intention of dealing with music as reassuring emotional merchandise for the listener or as a reassuring procedural baggage for the composer. Instead, I like to read or listen to music that questions itself, questions us, and invites us to a constructive revision or even to a suspension of our relationship with the past and a rediscovery along the tracks of future paths.
We like to think that music performs itself even before it is performed: not only because a composer can hear it playing silently in their own mind, but also because all its significant layers conceptually exhibit their autonomy and their mutual interaction.
The history of music has always been marked by a different taking possession of instruments and voices. Sometimes it has been possible to establish a new type of dialogue: think of Monteverdi's instrumental inventions, generated by his ideas on the representative style; think of Bach's Partitas for solo violin, where all violin techniques, past, present, and future, meet; think of Beethoven's piano transforming into a volcano (The Waldstein, for example, opus 106, opus 111, the Diabelli Variations...).
Luciano Berio has rewritten the finale of Giacomo Puccini's Turandot. He has faced and resolved a dense and passionate musical and poetic enigma. The new version of the opera debuts in concerto form on January 24 in the Canary Islands, conducted by Riccardo Chailly. Puccini dies in Brussels on November 29, 1924. He had been working on Turandot for at least four years: librettists Giuseppe Adami and Renato Simoni had long ago, after many revisions, delivered the text, inspired by an eighteenth-century fairy tale by Carlo Gozzi, which in turn was derived from a series of oriental tales; Puccini completed the first two acts, but in the third and final one, he stopped after the death of Liù, the slave in love with Prince Calaf, who in turn challenged decapitation just to seduce the powerful, sublime, ferocious Turandot. The finale remained to be written. On April 26, 1926 (meanwhile in '25, Berio is born) Arturo Toscanini conducts the premiere of the opera at La Scala; having reached the last note written by Puccini, he rests his baton on the music stand, turns to the audience, and more or less says these words: "Here the maestro stopped". But from the following performance, Turandot is performed with the finale composed by Franco Alfano and supervised by Toscanini. A music that never convinced: blatant, bombastic, superficial. And above all too fast in passing from lamentation to the most outward happiness, neglecting a sharp indication from Puccini: "Between Turandot and Calaf I desire romantic intimacy before they find themselves coram populo".
Maestro Berio, was it illness that stopped Puccini?
"No, it was the libretto, which I would call shameful. He understood that after Liù's death he could not end in glory with a love duet between Calaf and Turandot. He left precise indications to this effect: 'Turandot will end pianissimo'. This new Turandot will end exactly like that."
In your work, did you take into account Puccini's notes and sketches?
"Naturally, yes. The notes are numerous and interesting, often disorganized and here and there even experimental, with a hint of a dodecaphonic series. I also returned to previous moments, especially the first act, which is a masterpiece."
Will we listen - alone - to Puccini, or will his fragments encounter inspirations, creative cells from other composers?
"The first two bars of Turandot propose a true generating cell from which references derive to Gustav Mahler's Seventh Symphony and Arnold Schoenberg's Gurrielieder. And, not to mention, to Wagner's Tristan."
Among the notes relating to the finale, Puccini left a fascinating annotation: "Here Tristan". Why this reference to Wagner?
"He was obsessed with Wagner, who had a liberating effect on him, and with the harmonic developments of his music. Liù's last aria, 'Tu che di gel sei cinta', is preceded by some bars directly traceable to Tristan. Puccini was, among the Italians, the first European musician."
What prevented him from being considered a radical innovator of musical language?
"He was an extremely intelligent man, who aimed for success, being aware of the musical events contemporary to him, but he was still conditioned by the fact that whatever he did had to be successful."
Did you set all the words of the libretto to music, or did you make cuts?
"Not all of them, but this is not news: cuts are also made, for example, by Zubin Mehta in his recording. There are absurd words in the libretto: 'Laughs and sings our infinite happiness', says the chorus."}
in the concluding hymn, Calaf expresses himself with phrases such as "La bocca fremente" [The quivering mouth]. He is always excited."
How would you define the character of the Unknown Prince?
"A priapic prince."
In the program notes written for the occasion, Marco Uvietta highlights the importance of some of his choices and exclusions, especially regarding the happy ending of the opera, which has always seemed too rapid, insufficiently motivated. How does his "Turandot" conclude?
"In a less direct, less teleological way. Turandot ends more suspended, as happens in Eastern theater, without giving the story an explicit purpose. Very delicately, just before the end, the memory of Liù will return. Turandot ends with a meditation."
On April 21st, the first two of the three halls of the new Auditorium in Rome, designed by Renzo Piano and destined to become the new home of the Accademia di Santa Cecilia, of which you are president, will be inaugurated. A formidable opportunity for musical growth that the city has been waiting for for over sixty years. Will the deadlines be met?
"Yes. Everyone is working at an exemplary speed; it doesn't even feel like being in Italy. We will respect the timelines, finally."
(Sandro Cappelletto, "La Stampa", January 12, 2002)
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Pardon but the last video was supposed to be this:
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On May 28, 1913, in Paris, the first performance of Igor Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring took place.
Stravinsky - Le Sacre du printemps - The Rite of Spring - rehearsal - prova - Leonard Bernstein
The Rite of Spring - Rehearsal - Leonard Bernstein - Schleswig-Holstein Orchestra. English. Subtit...
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Frank wrote:The first performance of Igor Stravinsky's Le Sacre du printemps took place on May 28, 1913, in Paris.
It's tomorrow Frank!
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Carlos wrote:It's tomorrow, Frank!
Interesting, can you declare the sources? I'm looking around a bit and that's how it seems
http://www.ilpasquin...1799bbb10bf5265
The first performance took place on May 28, 1913, at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris under the direction of Pierre Monteux with an orchestra among the most colossal ever seen before then
Strange but interesting ...
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Perhaps perhaps:
On May 29, 1913, on the stage of the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris, Sergej Djaghilev's Ballets Russes company, causing great sensation, performed Vaslav Nijinsky's choreography to Igor Stravinsky's music: it was the absolute premiere of "The Rite of Spring" (original title "Le Sacre du printemps")
http://www.martinane...a-di-stravinsky
Then I must verify on a serious text, thanks Carlos for the report
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Johann Sebastian Bach
Wer mich Liebet der wird Mein wort Halten, cantata for soloists, choir, orchestra and basso continuo BWV 59
first performance: Leipzig, 28 May 1724.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKmr_K9Ptkc
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Luigi Boccherini
(Lucca, February 19, 1743 - Madrid, May 28, 1805)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fB82qQiwSgs
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Frank wrote:Then I must verify it against a serious text, thanks Carlos for the report
Don't mention it... The “Garzantina” gives May 29, 1913, and Igor S.'s Facebook page (managed by Boosey&Hawkes) has been counting down for a few days and today it reached “one day left!”.
