Maestro 007: feat. Tchaikovsky and J.S. Bach. Nutcracker Ballet Suite and Christmas Oratorio
Maestro Classical podcast: episode 7, a holiday celebration feat. Tchaikovsky and J.S. Bach.
1.
The London Symphony Orchestra
"Nutcracker Ballet Suite: Waltz Of The Flowers" (mp3)
from "Tchaikovsky: Nutcracker Suite / 1812 Overture"
(Everest Records)
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was a Russian composer of the Romantic era. While not part of the nationalistic music group known as "The Five", Tchaikovsky wrote music which, in the opinion of Harold C. Schonberg, was distinctly Russian: plangent, introspective, with modally-inflected melody and harmony.
Despite the compositional efforts of The Five, Tchaikovsky dominates 19th century Russian music as its greatest talent. While his formal conservatory training instilled in him Western-oriented attitudes and techniques, his essential nature, as he always insisted, remained Russian. This was true both in his use of actual folk song and his deep absorption in Russian life and ways of thought. His natural gifts, especially for melody (what he called the "lyrical idea"), give his music a permanent appeal. However, it was his hard-won though secure and professional technique, plus his ability to use it for the expression of his emotional life, which allowed him to realize his potential more fully than any of his major Russian contemporaries.
The Nutcracker is one of Tchaikovsky's best known works. While it has been criticized as the least substantial of the composer's three ballets, it should be remembered that Tchaikovsky was restricted by a rigorous scenario supplied by Marius Petipa. This scenario provided no opportunity for the expression of human feelings beyond the most trivial and confined Tchaikovsky mostly within a world of tinsel, sweets and fantasy. Yet, at its best, the melodies are charming and pretty, and by this time Tchaikovsky's virtuosity at orchestration and counterpoint ensured an endless fascination in the surface attractiveness of the score.
The Nutcracker, Op. 71, is a fairy tale-ballet in two acts, three scenes, by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, composed in 1891–92. Alexandre Dumas père's adaptation of the story "The Nutcracker and the Mouse King" by E.T.A. Hoffmann was set to music by Tchaikovsky (written by Marius Petipa and commissioned by the director of the Imperial Theatres Ivan Vsevolozhsky in 1891). In Western countries, this ballet has become perhaps the most popular ballet, performed primarily around Christmas time.
The composer made a selection of eight of the more popular numbers from the ballet before the ballet's December 1892 premiere, forming The Nutcracker Suite, Op. 71a, intended for concert performance. The suite was first performed, under the composer's direction, on 19 March 1892 at an assembly of the St. Petersburg branch of the Musical Society[1]. The suite became instantly popular; the complete ballet did not achieve its great popularity until around the mid-1960s.
Among other things, the score of The Nutcracker is noted for its use of the celesta, an instrument that the composer had already employed in his much lesser known symphonic ballad The Voyevoda (premiered 1891).^ Although well-known in The Nutcracker as the featured solo instrument in the "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy" from Act II, it is employed elsewhere in the same act.
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2.
The London Symphony Orchestra "Nutcracker Ballet Suite: Dance Of The Sugar Plum Fairy" (mp3)
from "Tchaikovsky: Nutcracker Suite / 1812 Overture"
(Everest Records) More On This Album
3.
Boston Bach Ensemble "Chorus: Jauchzet, frohlocket" (mp3)
from "J.S. Bach: Weihnachts-Oratorium - Christmas Oratorio, BWV 248"
(Musica Omnia)
The greatest musical setting of the Christmas story, compiled by Johann Sebastian Bach in 1734. Based on the Gospel of St. Luke, the text describes the nativity of Jesus and is adorned by some of Bach's most colourful and beautiful music. In modern performance, the piece is generally either presented as a whole, or split into two equal sections. The total running time for the entire work is nearly three hours. Scored for an Evangelist, four vocal soloists, four part chorus and full baroque orchestra, including trumpets, timpani and horns, the Christmas Oratorio is among Bach's best-loved works.
The Boston Bach Ensemble was founded in 1992 by Julian Wachner and Peter Watchorn, and performed principally at Boston University. It has performed cantatas, oratorios and masses by J. S. Bach, and features a choir of twenty young professional singers and a period instrument orchestra comprising some of the leading specialist musicians from the US, Canada, Australia and Europe. In 1998 the BBE recorded a celebrated live performance of Bach's Christmas Oratorio, which featured distinguished vocal soloists, including the celebrated Dutch baritone, Max van Egmond.
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4.
Boston Bach Ensemble "Recitative: Es begab sich aber" (mp3)
from "J.S. Bach: Weihnachts-Oratorium - Christmas Oratorio, BWV 248"
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5.
Boston Bach Ensemble "Recitative: Nun wird mein liebster Bräutigam" (mp3)
from "J.S. Bach: Weihnachts-Oratorium - Christmas Oratorio, BWV 248"
(Musica Omnia) More On This Album