From the Heart of Europe
Saturday, March 30, 1996
First Church Congregational, Cambridge, Massachusetts
Mendelssohn: Heilig; Der Erste Frühlingstag, Op. 48
Dvorák: V Prírode (In Nature's Realm), Op. 63
Brahms: Fünf Chöre, Op. 104; Sechs Lieder
Texts and translations
Program Notes
Nature, especially as embodied in the forest and its denizens, and ancient legend have always exerted a powerful grip on the imagination of European composers. In their view, Nature is a life force -- all powerful, all encompassing, forcing us to examine our place and our role in the greater scheme of things. We cannot control it -- rather, it controls us. Blessed or cursed, we are at its mercy. And, say some of these composers, this is a good thing which keeps us in our place, demands introspection and respect, and engenders appreciation of beauty. Even today, Nature remains an important part of European life. The forest -- a green, protective canopy, home to wild things beautiful and ferocious, is a refuge often sought for respite and contemplation. In Germany, entire families gehen spazieren, making weekly pilgrimages to the forest trails three seasons of the year. No wonder, then, that Nature and the outdoors -- birds, forests, streams, rocks, even the refreshing air -- become objects of praise and respect in European song and legend.
This tie to Nature as a life-enhancing force is the unifying idea of tonight's program, which celebrates joy and introspection on several spiritual levels, each uniquely reflective of the composer whose works we will perform.
In Nature's Realm, one of only three sets of songs Dvorák wrote for a cappella mixed chorus, is an unabashed billet doux from the composer to the bosky beauty of Nature in its many incarnations. Charmingly optimistic and filled with tuneful melodies reminiscent of Bohemian song, these five vignettes exhibit Dvorák's almost insolent ease in creating lilting, pleasant melody and exuberant, well-sprung rhythm. Each song creates an individual mood, one illustrated onomatopoetically in number 2. It is a pity that so many people are familiar with the work of this superbly gifted composer only through his symphonies. Any investigation into the wider body of his work -- chamber music, operas, large choral works, and more -- always pays a handsome dividend.
That Dvorák's works for voice are so unfamiliar in the United States may be due to the "problem" of the Czech language. But recent revivals at the Metropolitan Opera of works by Janácek, Smetana, and Dvorák now sung in their original language may signal an overdue recognition of this wonderfully rich speech. The Spectrum Singers offered these songs in English several seasons ago, but tonight they are sung in Czech, and we have been happily astonished by the enriched mood and color these works attain when sung this way. I suppose we should not be too surprised. After all, Brahms's Lieder certainly must be sung in German to "work"; so too should Dvorák be in Czech.
Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, also blessed with an astounding facility and ease of composition, wrote his several opera of unaccompanied choral Lieder with the understanding that they would most likely be performed informally, perhaps out-of-doors, as pleasant diversions for musicians and music lovers. The Spectrum Singers embrace these lovely, beautifully-crafted songs with serious attention to detail. In so doing, we hope to demonstrate that while the mood of these songs can often seem lighthearted, they are nonetheless finely wrought gems whose true beauty emerges when the composer's detailed and ubiquitous markings for style and nuance are meticulously observed. To nonetheless maintain and convey the light and pleasant feel the composer intended presents a significant challenge to performers.
Der erste Frühlingstag is the collective title of Mendelssohn's Op. 48, songs much at the core of the German "outdoors" tradition. In their naïve and blissful depiction of the joys of the first day of Spring, they accurately reflect another Romantic conceit -- the soul's symbolic rebirth with this special season's annual return.
Brahms, however strong his response to Nature, showed little patience with naïveté in any form, and it is noteworthy that his focus in his Op. 104 Fünf Chöre is on Autumn -- symbolically the approach of the end of life.
One of the great joys of every serious singer is the vocal music of Johannes Brahms. The scope, variety, depth of emotion, and sheer artfulness of this body of work is unmatched in the romantic repertoire. Very few composers have written so rich a variety of works for the voice that somehow speak so directly to the soul of the performer and listener, though Schubert and Mahler are certainly worthy of the same esteem. Choral singers love this music unabashedly -- choral directors, too. And this genre was certainly important to Brahms -- smaller/shorter vocal works total more than half of his musical output.
Nowhere in Brahms's a cappella choral music is there a more personal utterance than is found in Op. 104. Indeed, when one adds all his vocal repertoire for consideration, only parts of Ein Deutsches Requiem, the Alto-Rhapsodie, and the Vier ernste Gesänge achieve such intense levels of expression. On the surface, the diverse nature of the poetry would seem to work against a cohesive set of songs: two verses by Rückert of the same title but vastly differing content; a melancholic farewell to happiness by Max Kalbeck; a nostalgic, almost trite reminiscence of misspent youth via Josef Wenzig; and by Klaus Groth, a dour and depressing acceptance of Autumn and the end of life. But these subjects clearly spoke very directly to Brahms, and the music he wrote for these poems is his finest for a cappella chorus.
Rather than attempt to convey a verbal description or analysis of these extraordinary songs, it's probably best to leave this to the music. However, it should be noted that the writing throughout is for six voices -- a very rich SAATBB -- except in the last song, where four parts concentrate sonority and expression to their height of energy. Beginning quietly, the first two verses paint a gloomy, colorless portrait of Autumn, and a bleak reference to silent singers -- in this case, birds flying "as if to their graves" -- leaves no doubt of the metaphor. But when all seems at an end, the poetry implies mankind's acceptance of death by means of a transfiguration into another metaphoric image, that of a glowing sunset giving solace, even as glimpsed through tears. Here, in Brahms's most radiantly resigned music, we perhaps perceive the composer's recognition and acceptance of his own mortality.
Some of the last six of our Brahms Lieder were written as works for chamber performance -- music at home, perhaps -- works presumably intended for solo vocal quartet with piano accompaniment. One might ask: why delve into this repertoire when so much Brahms exists clearly intended for ensemble performance?
Some answers:
- Precedent exists for the concept of "choral Lieder."
- Certain of these quartets are unusually well-suited to larger ensemble performance. Those selected tonight are greatly enriched by the larger number of singers, and the impact of the conjunction of music and poetry is significantly enhanced.
- These works deserve to be heard by as many listeners as practicable.
We are indebted to Robert Shaw for supplying the impetus for this, for it was he who pieced together in 1992 "Seven Evening Songs" for performance and a subsequent recording. Our selection is different from his, but does follow his model in that this group of Lieder are all concerned with the night.
Waldesnacht, redolent of the atmosphere of the dark green woods, dates from 1874 and is notable for its rich harmonic progressions, suspensions, and sense of repose.
Der Abend, written but one year later is a concise masterwork, painting in almost operatic colors the symbolic descent of the sun in the form of Phoebus, the archer, and his chariot being welcomed into the sea by his lover Thetis, as Cupid leads the exhausted horses to a cooling stream.
Der Gang zum Liebchen from 1863 is drawn from traditional Czech sources, and is unusual in how the warm but restless accompaniment implies an undercurrent of agitation until the very end when the worried suitor presumably finds his lover safe from harm.
O schöne Nacht, Op. 92, dates from 1877 and is cherishable for its nightingale atop the lilacs and the ardent harmonies accompanying the moonstruck youth below en route to his beloved. This is "mood painting" of the highest order, and this work in particular especially benefits from ensemble performance.
The curious but charming little Abendlied, also from Op. 92 but a later work from 1884, offers unusually independent accompaniment to an often daringly distant choral harmony. Depicting the "peaceful struggle" between Night and Day as metaphor for life's fleeting moments of joy and sorrow, it melts into a calm lullaby at its close.
The finale to this group and our concert is itself finale to Brahms's Op. 103 Zigeunerlieder, a rousing gypsy salute to love and dreams of love.
Copyright (c) 1996, John W. Ehrlich
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