Inaugural Concert

Voltaire and Senator McCarthy, a “terrorist pianist” on a trip to the Alps, and the Czech roots of American symphonic music

Humor, fun, and irony, coupled with top-notch solo virtuosity that transcends genre boundaries, and finally, rich symphonic music – these are the keys to the program of the concert inaugurating the 26th Sinfonia Varsovia Swojemu Miastu (Sinfonia Varsovia To Its City) Festival. And, at the same time, also food for thought on the relationship and interplay between European and American culture.

Until Antonín Dvořák arrived in the United States in late September 1892, the prevailing view among American critics and high society was that the German symphonic model was universal. Therefore, following the Czech composer’s public declaration that it was necessary to establish a national American school based on African American and Native American traditions, a nationwide debate erupted in the press. Alongside numerous voices of support, complaints were heard, among other things, about the supposedly culturally inferior – and therefore unrepresentative – origins of the traditional melodies of former slaves and the continent’s first inhabitants. In one interview, Dvořák reportedly responded to these accusations by saying: “In African American melodies I discover all that is needed for a great and noble school of music.” The ultimate proof of his thesis was to be the premiere of Symphony No. 9, described in the press as “Dr. Dvořák’s American Symphony,” which took place on December 16, 1893, at Carnegie Hall. That evening, the utterly ecstatic audience began – contrary to etiquette – to applaud after the first movement of the work. Perhaps the finale resembled a melody of the popular Negro spiritual Swing Low, Sweet Chariot. After the second movement, in which the famous English horn solo is said to allude to the baritone of Harry T. Burleigh (a singer and composer who introduced Dvořák to the traditional African American repertoire), the audience demanded with the applause that the composer appear in his box. Although there is no definitive evidence that Dvořák studied Native American music, his inspiration from Longfellow’s poem The Song of Hiawatha is confirmed – the second movement of the symphony alludes to the legendary Native American chief’s journey across the prairie, while the third depicts a scene of Native American revelry (though to some critics it resembled a gathering of Czech villagers) featuring the dance of the shaman Pau-Puk-Keewis.

Although discussions about the possibility of creating an American national school did not subside following the success of From the New World symphony, and Dvořák himself quite firmly distanced himself from the direct use of original Native American melodies in the work in favor of capturing the general character of the music he had heard, the first step toward musical autonomy had been taken on the continent. In the following concert seasons in New York and Boston, compositions by local composers began to appear, bearing distinctive titles evoking American communities, such as the Indian Suite or the Gaelic Symphony. The idioms of 20th-century American music would be fully continued by its champions – Charles Ives, George Gershwin, Aaron Copland, and Leonard Bernstein.

In 1956, Bernstein composed two of his most popular works – the musical West Side Story and the operetta Candide, based on Voltaire’s Enlightenment satire. The dance suite from the musical and the overture to the operetta remain among the most frequently performed works of the 20th century. While in the musical about young protagonists Bernstein sought to avoid the “operatic trap” (i.e., hiring professionals whose operatic style and vocal displays would clash with the characters and the story), Candide was intended to be a work continuing the European operetta traditions of Offenbach or Gilbert and Sullivan – and… a Broadway show at the same time. And, as with Offenbach, a work commenting on the political reality of its time. Voltaire’s scathing satire targeting social relations and the inquisition proved relevant during the “witch hunt” instigated by Senator McCarthy in the early 1950s. Both Candide librettist, Lillian Hellman, and the composer were suspected of communist sympathies and were under FBI surveillance at the instigation of the conservative. In recent years, the operetta has been experiencing a renaissance – whether due to the centennial of the composer’s birth (2018) or political circumstances – but its overture remains a hit in concert halls regardless of the passing years. The structurally sophisticated composition combines excerpts from the most popular arias with a sonata form and a Rossini-style coda, as well as the energy, humor, and virtuosity of the orchestral introduction. 

Humor – and of a very ambiguous kind – was Friedrich Gulda’s trademark. This Austrian composer and pianist, an outstanding interpreter of the Viennese classics, teacher to Martha Argerich and Claudio Abbado, friend and collaborator of Chick Corea and Joe Zawinul, was at the same time the most unbearable, unpredictable, convention-breaking performer on stage. The pianist, with decidedly anarchist convictions, would sometimes ostentatiously undermine the “bourgeois” rules of the classical music world. Where changing the program during a concert or playing jazz and other “inferior” genres already shocked a sophisticated audience, Gulda pushed the boundaries even further by performing in inappropriate concert attire or without any at all. Apparently, he eagerly embraced the title of “terrorist pianist.” His “nonsense” reached its peak in 1999, when he announced his own death, wanting to see how he would be described in the obituaries. When the hoax was exposed, he called his next concert the “resurrection party.” He died for real on January 27, 2000, on the birthday of his beloved Mozart, just as he had wished and announced. In his funeral instructions, he had requested that no obituaries be published. In 1985–1986, Sinfonia Varsovia, under the baton of Jerzy Maksymiuk, toured with the artist, who at the time performed Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Concerto for Two Pianos in E-flat major, K. 365.

Gulda’s 1980 cello concerto is a unique work in the repertoire for this instrument. It is a five-movement composition in which the solo, improvised cello cadenza is not the final movement, but rather the central and longest one. In the remaining movements, the soloist is accompanied by a wind ensemble supported by guitar and percussion, playing everything from jazz-rock riffs (Overture), folk melodies straight from the Salzkammergut, an idyllic Austrian lake district (Idylle), a courtly minuet – albeit with an Eastern European flavor (Menuet) – or, finally, a concluding march, punctuated by jazz interludes yet consistently building toward a playful finale. Gulda’s concerto places special demands on the soloist, who must be both rhythmically disciplined and free in improvisation, strong in jazz-rock passages, and exceptionally sensitive to the instrument’s timbres in the classical sections. Julian Steckel, winner of the Witold Lutosławski International Cello Competition in Warsaw in 2003 and the prestigious ARD International Music Competition in Munich in 2010, possesses these qualities and is currently one of the world’s most outstanding cellists. The entire opening concert will be led by Radosław Szulc, concertmaster of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in Munich and an experienced conductor, under whose baton Sinfonia Varsovia masterfully performed Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 1 Titan at the opening concert of last year’s “Eufonie” Festival.

– Łukasz Strusiński

Partners

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  The project was carried out with financial support from the City of Warsaw as part of its regeneration initiatives