Simple Songs



Bohuslav Martinu
1890-1959

Bohuslav Martinu
Overture for Orchestra

Czech composer Bohuslav Martinu’s formative years were unusual. He spent his childhood in relative isolation in a tiny room at the top of the church tower in the small Moravian town where his father, a cobbler, served also as fire-watch, bell ringer and tower keeper. Until he started school, the boy seldom descended the 193 steps to the street level. He remarked that his whole aesthetic was influenced by his early bird’s eye view of the world, "…not the small interests of people, the cares, the hurts, or the joys but space, which I always have in front of me."

Although his musical talent manifested itself early in his childhood, he was expelled from the Prague Conservatory for “incorrigible negligence.” In spite of his strong nationalistic feelings, Martinu left Prague and newly independent Czechoslovakia in 1923 for Paris in order, as he said, “To escape the cult of Smetana and the pervasive influence of German music with its full metaphysical apparatus.” He had intended to stay in Paris for only a few months to study with Albert Roussel but ended up settling there for 17 years until forced to escape after the fall of France in 1940. Like many of Europe’s displaced intelligentsia, he reached the US via Lisbon in 1941. He lived in New York, composing and commuting to Princeton to teach. In spite of his many friends among the refugees from Europe, he never felt comfortable in this country. Nevertheless, his stay here turned into an extremely creative period with commissions and compositions, many written for his friends and colleagues, including the Five Madrigal Stanzas for violin and piano, written for violinist Albert Einstein and his friend, the pianist Robert Casadesus.

Composed in 1953, the Overture is a mini concerto grosso, written for a large orchestra with a seven-member concertino of solo instruments: Flute, 2 violins, viola, 2 cellos and oboe. The style is also neo-Baroque, contrapuntal and definitely tonal, but with a slight twentieth-century bite.

In keeping with the style of the concerto grosso, the solo ensemble responds with its own themes.

A gentle oboe solo breaks through the energy, almost like a mini-slow movement.

The Overture concludes with the main theme played in counterpoint with a chorale melody (origin unknown).



Aaron Jay Kernis
b. 1960

Aaron Jay Kernis
Simple Songs

In the now-defunct schism between the serialists and the listening public, Aaron Jay Kernis clearly sided with neither, carving out his own personal vision of what is beautiful, flowing seamlessly from moments of dissonance to moments of lyrical tonality. His style is eclectic, juxtaposing a variety of styles, including American popular and vernacular music. He was described by New York music critic Lawrence Cosentino as “...at or near the top of a list of young American composers who have made it safe for music lovers to return to the concert hall and enjoy new music that neither panders to nor alienates audiences.” His compositions have earned him many prizes and commissions, including the Pulitzer Prize in 1988 for his String Quartet No.2. He currently serves as composer in residence for the Minnesota Orchestra Composer Institute.

Self-taught on the violin, piano and in composition, Kernis attended the San Francisco Conservatory, the Manhattan School of Music, and Yale University, working along the way with John Adams, Charles Wuorinen, Morton Subotnick, Bernard Rands and Jacob Druckman.

Kernis composed Simple Songs in 1991 for soprano Susan Narucki and the New Music Consort (7+ players). In 1995 he expanded it for chamber orchestra for the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra and subsequently made an arrangement for soprano and piano. Kernis selected the texts from an anthology, The Enlightened Heart, edited by Stephan Mitchell, which deals with mystical poetry from the Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, and Muslim traditions. The chosen texts are a paean to the simple life. The musical settings are quite disparate in style and instrumentation.

1. Poet, dramatist and composer, the 12th century abbess Hildegard von Bingen wrote this poem to her own music in the style of liturgical plainchant. Kernis’s angular vocal line and atonal setting is the most contemporary of the five songs. It is accompanied by bright sounds of piccolo and hand bells.

2. Dramatically different in musical style from the previous song, these verses from Psalm 1 recall some of Mahler’s early songs.

3. The poet Ryokan, a Zen Buddhist monk lived in Niigata, Japan from 1758 to 1831 and is famous for his poetry and calligraphy. The flute and percussion parts imitate birdsong. The vocal line recalls in style the Hermit Songs of Samuel Barber.

4. A poem by Rumi, the 13th century Persian mystic Sufi poet.

5. Kernis dedicated this quiet, contemplative setting of Psalm 131 to the memory of Leonard Bernstein. It is largely instrumental with a long introduction and ending, the voice forming a middle section.



Felix Mendelssohn
1809-1847

Felix Mendelssohn
Symphony No. 3 in a minor, Op. 56, “Scottish”

Raised in affluence, Felix Mendelssohn enjoyed encouragement and the nurturing of his precocious musical talent. The Mendelssohn household was a Mecca for the intellectual elite of Germany, and the many family visitors fawned over the prodigy and his talented sister Fanny. Fortunately for the development of his rare abilities, his carefully selected teachers were demanding and strict.

One of the results of Mendelssohn’s financial security was his opportunity to take the Grand Tour in what was then considered the civilized world, Western Europe, Italy and Britain. In 1829, Mendelssohn traveled to England and then on to Scotland, where his visit to Fingal's Cave in the Hebrides Islands inspired The Hebrides Overture. It also produced the ideas that became the Scottish Symphony.

Started in Italy in 1830 but not finished until 1842, the Scottish Symphony was Mendelssohn's last – the numbering of the five symphonies reflecting their order of publication rather than composition. He dedicated the Symphony to the Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, whom he had met and charmed during one of his visits to England (the Queen actually sang while Mendelssohn accompanied her on the piano.)

While the music has an undeniably Scottish flavor, it does not specifically quote any folk tunes, a device which Mendelssohn despised. Writing to his father from Wales, he commented: "...anything but national music! May ten thousand devils take all folklore... a harpist sits in the lobby of every inn of repute playing so-called folk melodies at you – dreadful, vulgar, fake stuff; and simultaneously a hurdy-gurdy is tooting out melodies - it's enough to drive you crazy..." That being said, it's difficult to distinguish Mendelssohn's invented Scottish style melodies from the kind of musical nationalism he so despised.

Right from the introduction and the succeeding Allegro agitato, the Symphony's gloomy atmosphere gave rise to the myth that it was somehow inspired by the tragic life of Mary Queen of Scots.

More likely the Symphony reflects the bleak and stormy weather so prevalent in the Scottish highlands, lowlands and outlying islands alike. The climax of the first movement is a veritable hurricane, replete with chromatic moaning in the strings.

The second movement provides a little sunshine, its main theme as near to a Scottish folksong – with "Scottish snap" and all – as Mendelssohn could get without actually using one.

The third movement is in A major but comes through as passionate, if not at times anguished.

Its middle section, with somber dotted rhythm, suggests a horn call summons of fate.

Then, it's back to the Sturm und Drang of the final movement.

Mendelssohn ramps up the emotional to a fever pitch and then slowly cools it down in a clarinet solo joined by pianissimo basson and upper strings, conveying nothing so much as melancholic resignation.

But - perhaps with a bow to Beethoven - Mendelssohn ends the Symphony with a shift into A major with a new and optimistic theme to end it.