REQUIEM
March 2016
Program Notes by James Richard Frieman
Program Notes by James Richard Frieman
Sanford Dole and I welcome you to this artistic collaboration between the Bay Choral Guild and The New Millennium Chamber Orchestra. It’s a great pleasure for us both to be able to share with you Robert Levin’s remarkable reworking and completion of Mozart’s last great sacred work, along with a festive curtain-raiser by Beethoven and an early “festival cantata” by Ralph Vaughan Williams. We are confident that you will thoroughly enjoy these works and the combined musical talents of these fine ensembles.
Ludwig van Beethoven’s only full-length ballet, The Creatures of Prometheus, was the composer’s introduction to the Viennese stage. It was an immediate success and received nearly thirty performances at the Imperial Theater. The impetus for its composition came from the famed Neapolitan choreographer Salvatore Viganò, who was a composer himself and had studied composition with Luigi Boccherini. However, the serious “heroic-allegorical” nature of the story prompted Viganò to turn instead to Beethoven for the musical score. The original program notes from the 1801 performances tell how Prometheus, longing to bring sensibility and artistic refinement to a still rather primitive human race, brings to life two statues by stealing fire from the gods and bestowing it on the sculpted figures. He then takes them to Parnassus, where Apollo and other gods, demigods, and muses refine the passions of the newly-enlivened humans through music, dance, and the dramatic arts. Viganò’s biographer Carlo Ritorni later wrote a commentary on the choreographer’s ballets, in which he gives this description: “Overture: Pursued by the mighty wrath of Heaven, Prometheus enters, running through the forest towards his two clay-figures, to whose hearts he hastily applies the celestial fire.” Despite its early success, the complete ballet fell out of fashion with later audiences, although the overture has remained popular with concertgoers.
From its first publication in 1855 as a slim volume containing only a dozen poems, Walt Whitman’s literary sensation Leaves of Grass eventually grew to include more than 400 poems, of which No. 200 is “Toward the Unknown Region.” It’s probably difficult for us now to appreciate the effect that the artistic and spiritual liberation of Whitman’s poetry had on early twentieth-century composers such as Frederick Delius, Gustav Holst, and Ralph Vaughan Williams. To be sure, this rather early (1906) ‘Song’ for chorus and orchestra (Vaughan Williams’s first major choral work) shows us a composer still greatly influenced by Richard Wagner, but even here we can feel him consciously struggling to escape the gravitational pull of the German Romantic style and forge a new, distinctly English musical language. Christopher Palmer writes, “The spirit of adventure is always keen in Vaughan Williams; but after the great outburst at ‘Nor any bounds bounding us’ the words seem buoyed up on, bowled on by, wave after wave of musical excitement and elation. [It] was the work of a comparatively young man. But the music, no less than the text, has a transcendent timelessness that relates to any, and every, period in life.” For listeners familiar with William Schuman’s rather stark partial setting of the text in his Carols of Death, this setting of Whitman’s complete poem provides a very different experience, as it concludes with an exuberant “bursting forth” of the spirit into a realm of light, energy, and joy. Vaughan Williams’s orchestration calls for large forces (including three flutes, English horn, full brass, and two harps), but, in the composer’s typically ingratiating manner, the parts are thoroughly cross-cued to make it playable by an orchestra of virtually any size.
Since his death in 1791, the unfinished nature of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s famed Requiem has prompted numerous efforts to bring the composer’s final masterpiece to completion. In the foreword to the current edition, Robert Levin writes:
Ludwig van Beethoven’s only full-length ballet, The Creatures of Prometheus, was the composer’s introduction to the Viennese stage. It was an immediate success and received nearly thirty performances at the Imperial Theater. The impetus for its composition came from the famed Neapolitan choreographer Salvatore Viganò, who was a composer himself and had studied composition with Luigi Boccherini. However, the serious “heroic-allegorical” nature of the story prompted Viganò to turn instead to Beethoven for the musical score. The original program notes from the 1801 performances tell how Prometheus, longing to bring sensibility and artistic refinement to a still rather primitive human race, brings to life two statues by stealing fire from the gods and bestowing it on the sculpted figures. He then takes them to Parnassus, where Apollo and other gods, demigods, and muses refine the passions of the newly-enlivened humans through music, dance, and the dramatic arts. Viganò’s biographer Carlo Ritorni later wrote a commentary on the choreographer’s ballets, in which he gives this description: “Overture: Pursued by the mighty wrath of Heaven, Prometheus enters, running through the forest towards his two clay-figures, to whose hearts he hastily applies the celestial fire.” Despite its early success, the complete ballet fell out of fashion with later audiences, although the overture has remained popular with concertgoers.
From its first publication in 1855 as a slim volume containing only a dozen poems, Walt Whitman’s literary sensation Leaves of Grass eventually grew to include more than 400 poems, of which No. 200 is “Toward the Unknown Region.” It’s probably difficult for us now to appreciate the effect that the artistic and spiritual liberation of Whitman’s poetry had on early twentieth-century composers such as Frederick Delius, Gustav Holst, and Ralph Vaughan Williams. To be sure, this rather early (1906) ‘Song’ for chorus and orchestra (Vaughan Williams’s first major choral work) shows us a composer still greatly influenced by Richard Wagner, but even here we can feel him consciously struggling to escape the gravitational pull of the German Romantic style and forge a new, distinctly English musical language. Christopher Palmer writes, “The spirit of adventure is always keen in Vaughan Williams; but after the great outburst at ‘Nor any bounds bounding us’ the words seem buoyed up on, bowled on by, wave after wave of musical excitement and elation. [It] was the work of a comparatively young man. But the music, no less than the text, has a transcendent timelessness that relates to any, and every, period in life.” For listeners familiar with William Schuman’s rather stark partial setting of the text in his Carols of Death, this setting of Whitman’s complete poem provides a very different experience, as it concludes with an exuberant “bursting forth” of the spirit into a realm of light, energy, and joy. Vaughan Williams’s orchestration calls for large forces (including three flutes, English horn, full brass, and two harps), but, in the composer’s typically ingratiating manner, the parts are thoroughly cross-cued to make it playable by an orchestra of virtually any size.
Since his death in 1791, the unfinished nature of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s famed Requiem has prompted numerous efforts to bring the composer’s final masterpiece to completion. In the foreword to the current edition, Robert Levin writes:
Mozart’s Requiem—the composer’s last and unfinished work—was commissioned by Count Franz von Wallsegg, who wished to have it performed in memory of his departed wife as his own composition. In order to follow the conditions set by the Count and to receive the agreed-upon fee, Mozart’s widow Constanze decided to have the work completed in secrecy. The Requiem is known to the general public in the version undertaken immediately after Mozart’s death by his assistant Franz Xaver Süssmayr… The attacks against Süssmayr’s completion began in 1825, when the so-called ‘Requiem controversy’ erupted. Indeed, Süssmayr commits serious flaws which are foreign to Mozart’s idiom.
Fast-forwarding about 200 years, we find notable musicians and scholars including Franz Beyer, H. C. Robbins Landon, and Richard Maunder each publishing new versions of the Requiem in efforts to correct Süssmayr’s compositional and technical errors—efforts that meet with varying degrees of success. In each case, including Levin’s completion that we present here, those attempting to reconstruct Mozart’s Requiem have faced daunting tasks of editing, orchestration, and recomposition. In my estimation as well as that of a number of current critics and musicians, Levin’s is thus far the most successful at restoring the essence of Mozart’s original style and spirit while leaving intact where possible the invaluable and familiar work of Süssmayr, Freystädtler, Eybler, and other early contributors to the completion of the score.
Audiences familiar with the traditional Süssmayr version but new to Levin’s completion may be startled to find that he has introduced some important new musical material. Most striking are a lively Amen fugue—based on a sketch-leaf in Mozart’s hand from the year of his death—that follows the Lacrimosa and concludes the Sequenz; and new, more extensive Hosanna fugues at the end of both the Sanctus and Benedictus that unfold much more organically than those of Süssmayr or Beyer. There are also a number of smaller changes in the musical text (including new transitions connecting the Lacrimosa, Benedictus, and Agnus Dei to subsequent sections), and the orchestrations of some movements have been rendered more transparent and stylistically faithful to Mozart’s aesthetic.
The only portions of the score that survive in Mozart’s hand are the Introitus (Requiem aeternam), which is virtually complete; the complete drafts of the chorus and orchestral bass parts to the Kyrie; and similar drafts of the Sequenz movements (Dies Irae through the beginning of Lacrimosa) and Offertorium (Domine Jesu and Hostias). The Sanctus (and Benedictus), Agnus Dei, and Communio survive only in Süssmayr’s autograph, although the music of the Communio (Lux aeterna and Cum sanctis tuis) is taken directly from Mozart’s original Requiem aeternam and Kyrie.
However, as Levin points out, the overarching question about the Requiem remains: which sections of the work that aren’t part of Mozart’s fragmentary manuscript were nonetheless based on his musical ideas? He writes, “Both Constanze and Süssmayr claimed that these movements were completely Süssmayr’s work. Nonetheless, this claim has been contested.” A bit later, Levin continues (emphasis added):
Audiences familiar with the traditional Süssmayr version but new to Levin’s completion may be startled to find that he has introduced some important new musical material. Most striking are a lively Amen fugue—based on a sketch-leaf in Mozart’s hand from the year of his death—that follows the Lacrimosa and concludes the Sequenz; and new, more extensive Hosanna fugues at the end of both the Sanctus and Benedictus that unfold much more organically than those of Süssmayr or Beyer. There are also a number of smaller changes in the musical text (including new transitions connecting the Lacrimosa, Benedictus, and Agnus Dei to subsequent sections), and the orchestrations of some movements have been rendered more transparent and stylistically faithful to Mozart’s aesthetic.
The only portions of the score that survive in Mozart’s hand are the Introitus (Requiem aeternam), which is virtually complete; the complete drafts of the chorus and orchestral bass parts to the Kyrie; and similar drafts of the Sequenz movements (Dies Irae through the beginning of Lacrimosa) and Offertorium (Domine Jesu and Hostias). The Sanctus (and Benedictus), Agnus Dei, and Communio survive only in Süssmayr’s autograph, although the music of the Communio (Lux aeterna and Cum sanctis tuis) is taken directly from Mozart’s original Requiem aeternam and Kyrie.
However, as Levin points out, the overarching question about the Requiem remains: which sections of the work that aren’t part of Mozart’s fragmentary manuscript were nonetheless based on his musical ideas? He writes, “Both Constanze and Süssmayr claimed that these movements were completely Süssmayr’s work. Nonetheless, this claim has been contested.” A bit later, Levin continues (emphasis added):
Süssmayr’s own works allow us to compare his compositional procedures with those of the Requiem completion. From this comparison it emerges that Süssmayr normally composed movement by movement without regard for overall thematic integrity in a multi-movement work. In this regard, he resembles the majority of his contemporaries, who seem to have favored apparent thematic variety to rigorous thematic economy, even within movements. On the other hand, Mozart’s Requiem fragment is characterized by tight motivic and structural relationships.
He goes on to provide numerous examples of this structural integrity in Mozart’s autograph, concluding “It is to be stressed that the state of affairs described above cannot be reconciled with Süssmayr’s exclusive authorship” of the sections he claims to have composed entirely on his own.
This may provide us some insight as to why, for many listeners, Mozart’s voice still emerges clearly throughout this deeply-felt and immensely moving work. It’s a tribute to the power of his ideas and the brilliance of his musical thinking that, over the course of its long and controversial life, the Requiem—in whatever form we find it most appealing—remains a touchstone of Mozart’s sacred musical art and one of his most enduring and popular works.
This may provide us some insight as to why, for many listeners, Mozart’s voice still emerges clearly throughout this deeply-felt and immensely moving work. It’s a tribute to the power of his ideas and the brilliance of his musical thinking that, over the course of its long and controversial life, the Requiem—in whatever form we find it most appealing—remains a touchstone of Mozart’s sacred musical art and one of his most enduring and popular works.
