Fantasy Overture: Romeo and Juliet

When he completed the third and final version of Romeo and Juliet – he was working on it between 1869 and 1880 – Tchaikovsky    gave the world one of the greatest of all orchestral pieces based on a Shakespeare play. At least as far as Romeo and Juliet is concerned, it has never been surpassed. While it was not his intention to tell the whole story in musical terms, many of the most familiar aspects of the tragedy of the “star-crossed lovers” are vividly represented in the score. Friar Laurence is there in the woodwind chorale that opens the slow introduction. The street-fighting between brawling Montagues and Capulets animates the quick section that follows. The balcony scene – Romeo’s declaration of love on cor anglais and violas and Juliet’s whispered reply on violins – inspires a central episode of exquisite tenderness. Considerations of musical structure rather than story-telling take over from that point but there is no mistaking the indications of an unhappy ending before Friar Laurence’s theme is finally recalled to finish off the musical symmetry.

Béla Bartók (1881-1945)

Hungarian Sketches

Evening in Transylvania

Bear Dance

Melody

A Bit Tipsy

Swineherd Dance

Bartók’s exhaustive researches into the folk music of Hungary and beyond had far-reaching consequence both for his own development and for that of 20th century music in general. They also resulted in many little pieces, most of them for piano, which aim to do no more than present some of his favourite folk-tune discoveries in simple settings. The Hungarian Sketches are all orchestrations of short piano pieces, some of them for children, which are entirely unpretentious and at the same time enchantingly melodious, rhythmically compelling, irresistibly comic and, sometimes, all those things at once.

Camille Saint-Saëns (1835-1921)

Danse macabre, symphonic poem, Op.40

Danse macabre was such an alarming experience in its day that audiences howled in protest and, at an early performance in 1875, the composer’s mother fainted in shock. Based on a ghoulish poem by Henri Cazalis, it is a fantasy about the devil stamping on tombstones at midnight to awaken the dead and playing his violin to get the skeletons dancing until the cock crows and sends them scuttling back where they came from. Listeners to the symphonic poem nowadays are less inclined to be disturbed by the devilishly faulty tuning of the solo violin, to be offended by the unholy distortion of the Dies Irae chant, or to be    upset by the bony rattling of skeletons on the xylophone – which, incidentally, was an instrument never used in the orchestra before Saint-Saëns adopted it here. It is no less entertaining, however, for being less alarming.

Malcolm Arnold (1921–2006)

Four Welsh Dances Op.138

Allegro

Poco lento

Vivace

Andante con moto

Malcolm Arnold started writing national dances at the request of his publisher, who was no doubt very happy to receive the two brilliantly colourful and highly entertaining sets of English Dances in 1950 and 1951 respectively. Having done much the same in the meantime for material associated with Scotland, Cornwall and Ireland, he finally turned his attention to Wales – where, however, he seems to have been impressed more by the seriousness of the national character than its natural exuberance. The first dance begins amiably enough but ends with the percussive insistence which also characterises much of the faintly sinister second dance. The lively third dance makes a timely, if not totally cheerful, intervention before portentous brass and percussion return to dominate the last.

Antonin Dvorák (1841-1904)

Symphony No.8 in G major, Op.88

Allegro con brio

Adagio

Allegretto grazioso - molto vivace

Allegro    ma non troppo

A celebration of the Bohemian countryside, where it was conceived in the late summer of 1889, Dvorák’s Eighth Symphony is remarkable for the absence of conflict in it. The opening Allegro con brio begins in nostalgia and ends with a confirmation of the happy associations of the bird-call theme, first heard at an early stage on solo flute, as the final message. If there is a faintly regretful quality about the start of the Adagio, its essential character is determined by two serenely tuneful episodes with a melodic line gracefully poised over echoes of a village-band accompaniment. The Allegretto grazioso is an elegant waltz effectively offset by the more rustic dance of the middle section. Although it begins with a trumpet fanfare, the finale is based on the eloquent melody introduced by cellos. It proceeds for the most part as a set of variations, including a particularly exciting episode with trilling horns and the whole orchestra fortissimo, and ends in jubilation.

Rupert Avis © 2009

Tchaikovsky would probably never have thought of writing a concert overture based on Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet if the idea had not been suggested to him by another musician. The idea came from Mily Balakirev, the leading member of the “mighty handful” of Russian nationalist composers. While he wasn’t entirely in sympathy with Balakirev’s principles, Tchaikovsky knew that he had much to learn from him. So he immediately made a start on the project, accepting not only Balakirev’s design for the construction - an introduction representing Friar Laurence, an Allegro depicting the street brawls between Montagues and Capulets, a love scene between Romeo and Juliet, a development of the main themes, and a tragic ending - but also his scheme for the keys in which the various episodes would be set.

When, after a work’s work, he had got nowhere at all with it the young composer wrote to Balakirev for advice. “Arm yourself with galoshes and a stick,” he was told, “set off for a walk along the boulevards, starting at the Nikitsky, inspire yourself with your plan - and I’m convinced that before you reach the Sretensky boulevard you’ll already have some theme or at least some episode.” Sure enough, three weeks later Tchaikovsky wrote to Balakirev with the news that “the greater part is already composed in outline and, if nothing happens to hamper me, I hope it will be ready in a month and a half.”

Even so, the first performance of the original version of Romeo and Juliet, under Nicholas Rubinstein in Moscow on 16 March 1870, was not a success. So, following Balakirev’s advice, he made extensive revisions, replacing the original Friar Laurence melody in the introduction with the chorale we now know: considering how often that theme reappears, in varying tempi and different disguises, it is not difficult to imagine how much he had to rewrite. In 1880 he revised it again, cutting it, rescoring it, changing the title from Overture to Fantasy Overture and, at last, dedicating it to Mily Balakirev.

So Tchaikovsky’s first great orchestral work begins with Friar Laurence’s theme, a chorale “with an ancient Catholic character,” just as Balakirev had requested. Before the main part of the work, the Allegro giusto, the chorale is presented in a quicker tempo so that it can take its place in the development later. The first subject of the Allegro giusto is appropriately violent and argumentative, coloured by the clash of Montague and Capulet swords as the first major climax approaches. The second subject, on the other hand - Romeo’s song to Juliet on cor anglais and violas and Juliet’s whispered reply on violins - is a love scene of exquisite tenderness.

All the main themes are developed in the ensuing dramatic conflict which, inevitably, ends in tragedy. The funeral music, sadly tinged with low drum beats, a new chorale, and a final reminiscence of the love song act as a structural balance to the slow introduction. The last “suddenly thumped chords” did not please Balakirev, who rightly considered them “contrary to the meaning of the drama.” But Tchaikovsky resisted his colleague on this point, equally rightly, since they make an entirely convincing conclusion to the music that has preceded them even if there is no equivalent in Shakespeare’s play.

Tchaikovsky would probably never have thought of writing a concert overture based on Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet if the idea had not been suggested to him by another musician. The idea came from Mily Balakirev, the leading member of the “mighty handful” of Russian nationalist composers. While he wasn’t entirely in sympathy with Balakirev’s principles, Tchaikovsky knew that he had much to learn from him. So he immediately made a start on the project, accepting not only Balakirev’s design for the construction – an introduction representing Friar Laurence, an Allegro depicting the street brawls between Montagues and Capulets, a love scene between Romeo and Juliet, a development of the main themes, and a tragic ending – but also his scheme for the keys in which the various episodes would be set.

When, after a week’s work, he had got nowhere at all with it the young composer wrote to Balakirev for advice. “Arm yourself with galoshes and a stick,” he was told, “set off for a walk along the boulevards, starting at the Nikitsky, inspire yourself with your plan – and I’m convinced that before you reach the Sretensky boulevard you’ll already have some theme or at least some episode.” Sure enough, three weeks later Tchaikovsky wrote to Balakirev with the news that “the greater part is already composed in outline and, if nothing happens to hamper me, I hope it will be ready in a month and a half.”

Even so, the first performance of the original version of Romeo and Juliet, under Nicholas Rubinstein in Moscow on 16 March 1870, was not a success. So, following Balakirev’s advice, he made extensive revisions, replacing the original Friar Laurence melody in the introduction with the chorale we now know: considering how often that theme reappears, in different disguises, it is not difficult to imagine how much he had to rewrite. In 1880 he revised the score again, cutting it, rescoring it, changing the title from Overture to Fantasy Overture and, at last, dedicating it to Mily Balakirev.

So Tchaikovsky’s first great orchestral work begins with Friar Laurence’s theme, a chorale “with an ancient Catholic character,” just as Balakirev had requested. Before the main part of the work, the Allegro giusto, the chorale is presented in a quicker tempo so that it can take its place in the development later. The first episode of the Allegro giusto is appropriately violent and argumentative, coloured by the clash of Montague and Capulet swords as the first major climax approaches. The second episode, on the other hand – Romeo’s song to Juliet on cor anglais and violas and Juliet’s whispered reply on violins – is a love scene of exquisite tenderness.

All the main themes take part in the ensuing dramatic conflict which, inevitably, ends in tragedy. The funeral music, sadly tinged with low drum beats, a new chorale, and a final reminiscence of the love song act as a structural balance to the slow introduction. The last “suddenly thumped chords” did not please Balakirev, who rightly considered them “contrary to the meaning of the drama.” But Tchaikovsky resisted his colleague on this point, equally rightly, since they make an entirely convincing conclusion to the music that has preceded them even if there is no equivalent in Shakespeare’s play.