Overture to Semiramide
Gioaccino Rossini

Quick facts:

Born: 1792, Pesaro, Italy
Died: 1868, Paris, France
Composed: 1822 (in 33 days)
Premiere: February 3, 1823, Teatro La Fenice, Venice
Length: 12 minutes

Gioacchino Rossini, the Italian composer of nearly 40 operas, created overtures filled with sparkling virtuosity and witty musical jokes. Each takes us on a fun musical joyride. As a rule, Rossini's overtures had little to do with the operas which followed, and occasionally were even interchanged among operas. Semiramide may be the only instance in which Rossini quoted music from the opera in the overture.

Premiering in 1823 at Venice’s Teatro La Fenice, Semiramide was the final opera Rossini staged in Italy before relocating to Paris. The Overture begins as a distant murmur which grows louder and closer to climax in a grand musical "call to order." A horn quartet introduces music that will return in the first act finale. Later, the spirited piccolo gets its moment in the spotlight. All of this cheerful, effervescent music gives little hint of the gruesome drama which follows. The opera's plot involves a Babylonian queen who has conspired to kill her husband. Unbeknownst to her, the man she intends to marry is really their long-lost, and presumed to be dead, son.

"Rossini’s music is primarily rhythmic," conductor Mark Elder has observed. "It bubbles. Even in the saddest music, there is a sense of bubbling going along underneath."

Notes by Timothy Judd, thelistenersclub.com

Dolly Suite
Gabriel Fauré

Quick facts:

Born: 1845, Pamiers, France
Died: 1924, Paris, France
Composed: 1893-1896
Premiere: 1898, Alfred Cortot, Eduard Risler
Length: 18 minutes

The French singer, Emma Bardac (1862-1934), was the love interest, first of Gabriel Fauré, and later Claude Debussy.

Between 1893 and 1896, Fauré composed a set of six whimsically titled piano duets to mark birthdays and other events in the life of Bardac's young daughter, Régina-Hélène, who was known as "Dolly." In 1906, conductor Henri Rabaud orchestrated the "Dolly" Suite, and used it to accompany "an ingenious ballet" at Paris' Théâtre des Arts.

The Suite begins with a dreamy lullaby (Berceuse) which Fauré composed years earlier, and which he presented as a gift to mark Dolly's first birthday. The second piece (Mi-a-ou) is a delightfully irregular dance. Its title references the two-year-old child's attempts to pronounce the name of her brother. Containing a quote from Fauré's First Violin Sonata, Le jardin de Dolly opens the door to a delightfully adventurous wandering melody, evocative of a serene garden. The gracefully bounding Kitty-valse does not refer to a cat, but rather to the playful family dog, Ketty. The introspective, chromatic Tendresse was dedicated originally to the wife of Fauré's music publisher. Its middle section contains a beautiful flowing melody which unfolds in canon between high and low voices. The Suite concludes with a bright, sunny Spanish dance (Le pas espagnol). It is music which overflows with bubbly rhythms, and an infectious sense of cheerful exuberance.

Notes by Timothy Judd, thelistenersclub.com

Symphony No. 5 in E Minor
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

Quick facts:

Born: 1840, Votkinsk, Russia
Died: 1893, Saint Petersburg, Russia
Composed: May-August, 1888
Premiere: November 17, 1888, Mariinsky Theatre, Saint Petersburg
Length: 44 minutes

Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 5 in E minor begins in the shadows. A halting melody emerges in the solo clarinet, shrouded in the gloom of the low strings. It's a melody built on simple, repeating phrases—something akin to a lamenting Russian folksong. In fact, this theme seems to have developed out of a phrase from Mikhail Glinka's 1836 tragic opera, A Life for the Tsar, accompanying the words, "turn not into sorrow." The Fifth Symphony's introduction lingers in this strange, oppressive, almost subterranean soundscape. Our ears get no relief from these dark, veiled colors. The solo clarinet becomes a haunting, unrelenting presence, articulating what will be the Symphony's recurring "idée fixe.”

The first theme (Allegro con anima) is an outgrowth of the slow introduction. Those initial, halting first steps in the strings in the introduction's first measures are now transformed into a mysterious march over which a restless and spirited melody takes shape. The buoyant dotted rhythms which pervade this melody are not unlike the dancelike rhythms we hear in the opening movement of Beethoven's Seventh Symphony.  An exhilarating sense of rhythmic conflict abounds in this music, which never seems far away from the swirling motion and grace of Tchaikovsky's ballet scores. The lushly Romantic second theme turns suddenly into more jaunty ballet music amid exuberant, running pizzicati. A third theme (molto piu tranquillo) rounds out the exposition section. Although in 6/8 time, it gives us a sense, momentarily, of a waltz.

The first movement's development section unleashes a torrent of swirling motivic fragments from the exposition section, amid an exuberant dialogue of conversing voices. The coda section closes with the first theme's march fading into the distance. In the final bars, we return to the gloomy depths of the orchestra—the same unsettling world which closes the Sixth Symphony.

The second movement (Andante cantabile, con alcuna licenza) opens with a low string “choir." Moving from the solemnity of B minor to the warmth of D major, this introduction sets the stage for the movement's famous horn solo. Noble, nostalgic, and lamenting, the horn is soon joined by other voices, from the clarinet to the oboe and bassoon. The expansive second theme grows into a soaring, passionate statement. But this exalted statement is cut off rudely by a return of the "idée fixe" theme, this time as an outburst in the brass, punctuated by fanfare figures. We reach the highest "high" only to plunge back into the lowest depths. The second movement ends with serene acceptance. The final resolution comes with the solo clarinet and the strings—the same voices we heard in the first movement's introduction, but this time wrapped in the warmth of D major.

The third movement is a graceful yet fleeting waltz which combines with a faster scherzo trio section. In the opening bars, the rhythmic ground shifts out from under the melody, obscuring our sense of the downbeat. This music is filled with more rhythmic games in the form of irregular phrases, and the superimposing of 4/4 and 3/4 time in the trio section. Following all of this frivolity, the "idée fixe" theme slips into the final bars as an awkward guest.

In the introduction of the final movement, the gloomy, minor "idée fixe" theme suddenly transforms into E major. Trumpet fanfares ring out. Just before launching into the furious first theme, listen to the way the music teases us with the repetition of the theme's first three pitches (E, D-sharp, E), as if unsure of the way forward. As the oboe begins an ebullient statement, sparkling pizzicati rise through the string section. A few moments later, a similar rising line emerges as a thrilling, heroic statement in the brass.

The Fifth Symphony's dramatic journey ends in the ultimate transcendence. The final movement's exhilarating momentum comes to a halt on a tension-filled dominant, followed by a shocking silence. Then, as if to leave behind all that came before, we embark on a triumphant statement of the "idée fixe" in E major. The theme swells in the strings like a banner unfurled in the wind. Then, it becomes a celebratory proclamation in the trumpets. The final bars bring a restatement of the first movement's "march" theme, this time in blazing major.

Notes by Timothy Judd, thelistenersclub.com