Daniel Saidenberg Faculty Recital Series

Roger Tapping, ViolawithLaurie Smukler, Violin Qing Jiang, Piano

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Major funding for establishing Paul Recital Hall and for continuing access to its series of public programs has been granted by The Bay Foundation and the Josephine Bay Paul and C. Michael Paul Foundation in memory of Josephine Bay Paul.

The Juilliard Schoolpresents

Faculty Recital Roger Tapping, Violawith Laurie Smukler, Violin Qing Jiang, Piano

Friday, March 16, 2018, 7:30pmPaul Hall

Part of the Daniel Saidenberg Faculty Recital Series

JOHANNES BRAHMS Scherzo in C Minor, Op. 4 (1833–97) from F-A-E Sonata for Viola and Piano (1853)

ALBAN BERG Four Pieces for Viola and Piano, Op. 5 (1913) (1885–1935) (trans. Roger Tapping) Mässig–Langsam Sehr langsam Sehr rasch Langsam

BRAHMS Horn Trio in E-flat Major, Op. 40 (1865) (transcription for violin, viola, and piano approved by Brahms) Andante Scherzo: Allegro: Molto meno allegro Adagio mesto Finale: Allegro con brio

Intermission

DMITRI Sonata for Viola and Piano, Op. 147 (1975)SHOSTAKOVICH Moderato(1906–75) Allegretto Adagio

Performance time: approximately 1 hour and 35 minutes, including one intermission

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Notes on the Program By Gavin Plumley

A personal, confessional quality runs through the music on tonight’s program. Both of the works by Johannes Brahms were inspired by connections with his friends and family. With Alban Berg, of course, everything was emotionally intense, as can be heard in his four aphoristic pieces for clarinet and piano. And it was Berg who became one of the most important figures in Dmitri Shostakovich’s apprenticeship, before the Soviet authorities suppressed what they deemed Western, “bourgeois” music. In Shostakovich's Sonata for viola and piano, however, we find him at the very end of his life, no longer pondering the state of the nation but his own mortality.

Tonight’s recital may end with old age, but it begins with youth: Brahms was just 20 when he penned his 1853 Scherzo. It is the product of a remarkable meeting of musical minds that year, including Joseph Joachim, whom Brahms had met in Göttingen, Germany, during the summer, and the violinist’s esteemed friends Robert and Clara Schumann. With Joachim’s encouragement, Brahms presented himself at the Schumanns’ home in Düsseldorf on September 30 and made a marked impression. Robert encapsulated his thoughts about the fledgling composer in an article for the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik, lauding Brahms as a “young eagle” who had “sprung like Minerva fully armed from the head of the son of Cronus.” Clara, on the other hand, may well have harbored more amorous thoughts; she and Brahms continued to have a complex relationship for the rest of their lives.

By the time he met the Schumanns, Brahms had amassed a significant portfolio of works, including the Scherzo for Piano, Op. 4, which Liszt had already played, and his Piano Sonata in F Minor, Op. 5. The Scherzo we hear this evening echoes the stormy and impetuous nature of those works, albeit here paying tribute to Joachim. After a surprise visit from the violinist in mid-October, Schumann had the idea that he and Brahms, as well as Schumann’s pupil Albert Dietrich should write a sonata for violin and piano, each taking responsibility for an individual movement (or movements). Dietrich wrote the opening Allegro, Schumann composed the second and fourth movements, and Brahms took on the challenge of the Scherzo. Each was to be branded in the form of a musical cryptogram with Joachim’s personal motto, “Frei aber einsam” (free but lonely), hence the Sonata’s eventual title.

Brahms’s Scherzo, heard here in a transcription for viola and piano, is haunted by the spirit of the equivalent movement in Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony (also in C minor). Its characteristic, driving rhythms make their presence felt as the music swings violently between 6/8 and 3/4 time. The second section bursts forth in A-flat major, so often the complement to Beethoven’s and, in turn, Brahms’s C minor daemon, before climbing towards the tonic major. The Trio is more demure, in effect representing

Johannes Brahms Born: May 7, 1883, in Hamburg, Germany Died: April 3, 1897, in Vienna, Austria

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the eye of the storm, but the Scherzo’s rhythmic tattoo makes its presence felt here too, pushing ahead to a repeat of the initial charge.

If the Scherzo reveals Brahms’ impulsive nature, then his Horn Trio, Op. 40 of 1865 is characteristic of an equally prominent vein of melancholy. There was good reason for its muted tone, given that it was composed in the immediate aftermath of Brahms’ mother’s death. The Trio is cast in four movements and was conceived with a natural horn in mind. While the part is taken here by a viola, it is important to note the features of that original instrument. Brahms’ father, for instance, played a natural horn, the limited range of which—hence the tonic of E flat throughout—was compensated by its innate (if muted) nobility. The rich timbre of the viola provides a fitting equivalent.

The work opens with an extended ternary (ABABA), rather than the expected sonata, form. Yet, as later commentators noted, a spirit of development is apparent throughout. Rarely, however, is the mood of pensive prayerfulness disturbed and even the most rhapsodic piano writing cannot upset the serenity of its melodies. The contrasting ebullience of the Scherzo, not unlike that for Joachim’s F-A-E Sonata, constitutes a backward glance to Brahms’ youth (when his mother was still alive).

A richer harmonic palette is revealed in the Adagio mesto, which is veiled in E flat minor. The shift to the darker side of the tonic required the horn to “stop“ various notes, i.e. bending the pitch by placing a hand deep into the bell. A viola may adapt more easily to such expressive chromaticism, but the sombre tone remains. Finally, Brahms returns to traditional hunting tropes, so often employed by Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven. Indeed, this last Allegro strikes a manifestly Classical pose, shrugging off mourning and delivering a celebration of life.

By the time Brahms completed his Horn Trio, he was firmly resident in Vienna, the city that was to be his home until his death in 1897. Alban Berg was just a teenager at the time, but his later teacher and mentor Arnold Schoenberg was profoundly moved by Brahms’ death. He and his future brother-in-law, Alexander Zemlinsky, were self-professing “Brahmins,” who saw great ingenuity within the music of this supposedly conservative composer. Indeed in later life Schoenberg would call him “the progressive.”

Of course there was perhaps nobody more forward-looking than Schoenberg himself. When Berg became his pupil, in October 1904, Schoenberg had rejected the Brahmsian idiom of his earlier chamber music and instead pursued a more expressive, dissonant language. And Schoenberg was as radical a teacher as he was a composer. Instructing

Alban Berg Born: February 9, 1885, in Vienna, Austria Died: December 24, 1935, in Vienna

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Notes on the Program (Continued)

Dmitri Shostakovich Born: September 25, 1906, in St. Petersburg, Russia Died: August 9, 1975, in Moscow, Russia

Berg, he found that his pupil “was absolutely incapable of writing an instrumental movement or inventing an instrumental theme.” Berg’s world was that of song and Schoenberg was determined to broaden his pupil’s horizons. While vocal music was always to remain Berg’s primary outlet, not least in his two operas, Wozzeck and Lulu, he duly followed Schoenberg’s advice and published his Piano Sonata as his first official opus in 1910. Four particularly expressive songs followed as Berg’s Op. 2, with a String Quartet as his Op. 3, before five more songs, setting postcard texts by the Café Central habitué Peter Altenberg, were released as the fourth official work in his catalogue.

Following this instrumental-vocal-instrumental scheme, Berg’s Op. 5 featured Four Pieces for Clarinet and Piano. They may mirror the four movements of the late Romantic sonata, much like the works Brahms wrote for the clarinettist Richard Mühfeld, but the Pieces are brief, even aphoristic—more akin to the Altenberg songs—and compressed into the timespan customarily occupied by just one sonata movement. It was Schoenberg who had called for scores to be “concise.” Music, he felt, should not be built, but expressed. Accordingly, Berg wrote in the free, atonal language his teacher described as emancipated dissonance. The opening movement is often playful, with various scurries and trills, though it soon turns brooding, as in the elegy that follows. Indeed, a feeling of melancholy persists throughout, with the third movement preparing for a particularly somber Finale. The throbbing chords here are reminiscent of the last of the four nocturnal songs featuring poems by Friedrich Hebbel and occultist Alfred Mombert that Berg had issued as his Op. 2 a few years earlier.

A mournful mood equally hangs over Shostakovich’s very last work. The composer had been aware of ill-health for a while, having suffered from polio since 1958. The disease first manifested itself as a weakness in his right hand and, consequently, Shostakovich terminated his career as a pianist on May 28, 1966, the night he suffered his first heart attack. Having completed his 15th Symphony in September 1971, he then suffered a second attack, which marked the end of his composition of large-scale works. The final years of Shostakovich’s life were therefore dedicated to song and chamber music, closing with this Sonata for viola and piano.

For his final work, Shostakovich inverted the traditional fast-slow-fast scheme, opening instead with a stark Moderato. The viola’s open strings recall similar gestures from the start of Berg’s Violin Concerto, his last completed composition. When the piano enters, it brings with it a delicate touch, though this prompts the viola to become more contemplative, with music readily suggesting a threnody. This in turn gives rise to a violent middle section, full of explosive statements, albeit with little to unify the two players.

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Please make certain that all electronic devices are turned off during the performance. The taking of photographs and the use of recording equipment are not permitted in this auditorium.

The Allegretto takes a more ironic path, quoting liberally from the Overture to Shostakovich’s unfinished opera The Gambler, which he was writing during World War II. After this mordant interlude, the final Adagio sounds particularly otherworldly. Shostakovich said its music was written “in memory of a great composer,” namely Beethoven, whose “Moonlight” Sonata is evident in both the piano’s arpeggios and the viola’s dotted motif. In the end, however, Shostakovich came to realize that he was writing his own requiem and the Sonata had its premiere in Leningrad on October 1, 1975, two months after his death.

Gavin Plumley specializes in the music and culture of Central Europe and appears frequently on BBC radio, as well as writing for newspapers, magazines, opera houses, and concert halls around the world. He is the commissioning editor of English-language program notes for the Salzburg Festival.

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Meet the Artists

Roger Tapping

Violist Roger Tapping joined the Juilliard Quartet and the Juilliard School viola faculty in 2013. The quartet recently launched an iPad video app of Schubert’s “Death and the Maiden” quartet, and a CD of music by Beethoven, Davidovsky, and Bartók. Mr. Tapping was a member of the Takács Quartet for a decade and their Decca/London recordings won three Gramophone Awards, a Grammy Award, and three additional Grammy nominations. He has been on the faculty of the New England Conservatory (where he directed the Chamber Music program), Boston Conservatory, and Longy School of Music. His faculty activities include summers with the Perlman Chamber Music Workshop, Tanglewood String Quartet Seminar, Yellow Barn, and Kneisel Hall. Mr. Tapping played in a number of London’s leading chamber ensembles, making several highly-acclaimed CDs before joining Britain’s Allegri Quartet. He taught at the Royal Academy of Music in London, was principal viola of the London Mozart Players, a member of the English Chamber Orchestra, and a founding member of the Chamber Orchestra of Europe. He has performed frequently as a guest with many distinguished quartets from the U.S. and Europe, and was a member of the Boston Chamber Music Society. Mr. Tapping is a member of the Order of the Knight Cross of the Hungarian Republic, holds an honorary doctorate from the University of Nottingham, and is a fellow of the Guildhall School of Music in London.

Laurie Smukler

Violinist Laurie Smukler grew up in Cleveland and started performing early, winning local competitions, and playing as a soloist with the Cleveland Orchestra at the age of 14. She graduated from Juilliard where she studied with Ivan Galamian. As a soloist, she has performed with many regional and national orchestras, and as a recitalist, plays regularly in New York, and in other centers including Tokyo and Seoul. She frequently presents master classes at conservatories across the country, such as the Shepherd School of Rice University, Peabody Conservatory, the University of Michigan, University of Tennessee at Memphis, and Oberlin College. She was an original member and founding first violinist of the Mendelssohn String Quartet, which she toured with internationally for eight years. She has performed and toured with Lincoln Center Chamber Music Society and Music From Marlboro. With her husband, violist Ira Weller, she directed and performed in the series The Collection in Concert, at the Pierpont Morgan Library for 10 years. She joined the Juilliard faculty in 2014 and also teaches at the Manhattan School of music and Bard College Conservatory of Music. On the faculty of the Kneisel Hall Chamber Music Festival for over 20 years, she is its artistic director. Ms. Smukler has premiered works by contemporary composers including Ned Rorem, Morton Subotnik, Steven Paulus, Shulamit Ran, and Bruce Adolphe.

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Qing Jiang

Chinese-born pianist Qing Jiang enjoys a diverse career in solo, chamber, and contemporary music. She has appeared in Alice Tully Hall, Weill Recital Hall, and Jordan Hall, as well as the U.K.’s Snape Maltings Hall, and China’s Shenzhen Poly Theater. In 2015–16, she received glowing reviews for her concerto performances with the Chattanooga Symphony, Adrian Symphony, and Britten-Pears Orchestra in England under Oliver Knussen. Recent engagements include a six-city concert tour in China, a concerto performance of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue with the Bucknell University Orchestra, and her debut with the Shanghai Quartet at Music Mountain. A dynamic chamber musician, She has performed with Itzhak Perlman, Donald Weilerstein, Laurie Smukler, Anthony Marwood, and Gil Kalish, as well as with the members of the Peabody Trio and the Emerson, Juilliard, Shanghai, Kronos, and Parker string quartets. Her festival appearances include those of Ravinia, Aspen, Yellow Barn, Music@Menlo, Kneisel Hall, Aldeburgh Music, Changjiang International Festival, MasterWorks, and the Perlman Music Program. Equally experienced with contemporary music, Qing Jiang has worked closely with composers Brett Dean, Jennifer Higdon, Jörg Widmann, and Daniel Temkin. The first Chinese recipient of a Jack Kent Cooke Arts Scholarship, she holds degrees from Arizona State University, Juilliard, and New England Conservatory. Principal teachers include Caio Pagano, Robert McDonald, Wha Kyung Byun, and the late Patricia Zander. She is an assistant professor of piano at Bucknell University and is on the faculty at the Kneisel Hall Chamber Music School and Festival. (qingjiangpiano.com)

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TUESDAY, MARCH 207:30pm • Paul HallJuilliard Jazz EnsemblesWhat We Hear: Student CompositionsTickets: $20

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 21 THROUGH SATURDAY, MARCH 24Peter Jay Sharp TheaterSpring Dances 2018Juilliard’s dancers present three masterworks by

Merce Cunningham (Sounddance), Crystal Pite

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THURSDAY, MARCH 227:30pm • Alice Tully Hall Vocal Arts Honors RecitalSoprano Felicia Moore and mezzo-soprano

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WWI, Armistice: The Journey Home explores

timeless themes of longing, loss, love, and the

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Musical selections range from Schubert's Der

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Rudi Stephan, who was killed in the war

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