Indelible Brahms

Saturday, September 20, 2025
– 7:30pm –
Durgin Performing Arts Center @ Clinton High School – Click for maps

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Overture to the Season Dinner
Join the conductor, musicians, and your friends for a delightful meal before the concert.
Vista Grande – 2141 16th Street NW
5:00 PM
Reservations required by September 15, call Karl Wolf at 563-212-6075

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Program Notes

Louise Farrenc (1804-1875)
A remarkable French composer, pianist and educator, Louise Farrenc was long overlooked like so many women in composition. Born into a distinguished artistic family in 1804 in Paris, she grew up surrounded by painters, sculptors and artists of all genders, rare in 19th century France. Like many upper-class girls of the time, Farrenc began studying piano early, but what set her apart was her undeniable talent. Attracting the attention of renowned musicians, she was accepted to the Paris Conservatory at just 15 years old.

Following her academic career, she became a concert pianist and in time was recognized as a leading musician of her era. Eventually, her reputation earned her a groundbreaking professorship at the Conservatory, the only woman and sole female professor for the entire 19th century. Despite her talent and accomplishments, her compositions never received the same recognition as those of her male counterparts. Her Overture No. 2, a prime example, was never published during her lifetime and has remained relatively neglected. At the time of its composition, the concert overture was still a developing form, with only a few
by Berlioz and Mendelssohn having been performed in Paris. Farrenc’s remarkable example was so skillful that even Hector Berlioz, one of the greatest orchestrators in history, studied her work.

Overture No. 2 opens with a bold, commanding introduction, immediately grabbing the listener’s attention. Skillfully employing different sections of the orchestra, Farrenc creates a rich and vibrant tonal palette using dynamic contrasts and nuanced textures. All the musical elements come together in a rousing conclusion, with the orchestra surging forward in power and unity.

Manuel de Falla (1876-1946)
A prominent Spanish composer of the early 20th century, Manuel de Falla was deeply inspired by the rich folk traditions of his homeland, especially Andalusian flamenco. From 1907 to 1914 he lived in Paris where he met and was influenced by Ravel, Debussy and Dukas. All his life he continued to adopt new ideas as he was exposed to other approaches to musical nationalism.

His Spanish Dance No. 1 is a passionate and rhythmically vibrant composition
drawing on the flamenco traditions. The fiery opening bursts forth with the intensity of a
dancer’s footwork and continues in intricate patterns, syncopations and cross-rhythms
that propel the music relentlessly forward.

The juxtaposition of moments of fervent passion and delicate, lyrical passages reflects the dichotomy of the flamenco tradition which encompasses both exuberance and melancholy. Melodies are infused with the distinct flavors of Spanish folk music, featuring characteristic intervals, ornamentations and expressive gestures. As the Spanish Dance reaches a breathtaking crescendo, the orchestra unleashes a torrent of
sound that reverberates with the spirit of the dance.

Jean Sibelius 1865-1957
A Finnish composer of the late Romantic and early Modern periods, Jean Sibelius is the best- known symphonic composer in all of Scandinavia. In the late 1800s, Finland’s struggle to escape Russia’s yoke inspired the young Sibelius to turn to the Kalevala, a collection of epic Finnish mythology voiced in natural local speech to turn up nationalist sentiment. His beloved Finlandia (1900) underscored the spirit of self-determination, a narrative of growth and eventual triumph aligned with his country’s aspirations.

Written early in his career, En Saga was the first of what would become eight Finnish nationalistic tone-poems, winning him hero status in Finland and launching international renown. After premiering his gigantic choral symphony Kullervo, a work that required so many musicians he was to hear it only five times in his life, Sibelius moved away from his earlier interest in Richard Wagner’s music to explore the tone
poem made popular by Liszt. Perhaps his most enigmatic piece, En Saga has no specific literary origin. Sibelius himself only offered the following: “En Saga is the expression of a state of mind.”

The music unfolds with a stark, brooding atmosphere, rich in Nordic color in a variety of textures. It opens with quiet, ominous murmurings in the lower strings and winds, gradually building into sweeping gestures and emotional surges. Sibelius creates a sense of journey, haunted, searching, and at times, heroic with hints of battles, solitude or even melancholy triumph. En Saga marked a turning point in Sibelius’ career, showing his early mastery of orchestral color and form, a powerful example of how music can suggest an epic story without uttering a word.

Johannes Brahms 1833-1897
One of the beloved “Three B’s” of the classical music world, Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist who wrote symphonies, concerti, chamber music, piano and choral works and more than 200 songs.

Although the second half of the 19th century saw the rise of the new Romantics, Brahms championed the conservative Classical tradition of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven. Brahms’ importance to German culture was significant even in his own day, truly a composer made for the Vienna of the time. From his training in the traditions of the Classical era into the later Romantic era, Brahms richly connected a number of threads
in the musical world.

It took more than two decades for Brahms to complete his First Symphony, a delay he acknowledged as due to respect for Beethoven’s great set of nine. Once his First was created, however, his remaining three symphonies followed fairly rapidly during his summer vacations. Self-critical to the point of destroying an unknown number of works, Brahms regarded symphonic writing as a tough proposition, making the existence of four something the world can be grateful for.

He was also successful writing works in a lighter vein. His two volumes of Hungarian Dances for piano were a phenomenal success, brilliant arrangements of Roma tunes he had collected over the years. His Liebeslieder (love songs) waltzes sparkle with humor, incorporating graceful Viennese dance tunes, and many of his greatest songs were written at this time.

In his orchestral works Brahms displays an unmistakable and highly distinctive deployment of tone color, especially in his use of woodwind and brass instruments. His Symphony No. 4 in E Minor, the darkest of his works, may well have been inspired by the Ancient Greek tragedies of Sophocles Brahms had been reading at the time. Known to harbor a lifelong melancholy vein, he may also have been contemplating his own
mortality as he entered his fifth decade of life. For all its warmth and beauty, Brahms’ 4th has an undeniably tragic character, based on a simple theme he found in a Bach cantata and developed into a set of 30 highly intricate variations.

Musically, Brahms’ Fourth continued the development of his astounding technique; many critics today consider it his finest work. Each melody evolves seamlessly from what came before, creating a complex web of musical interrelations. His language had also become incredibly focused and succinct; he says as much in a few measures as other composers do in entire phrases.

The symphony begins with a simple, hauntingly beautiful melody tinged with a feeling of melancholy as the upper strings play the movement’s signature “sighing” motif, repeated by the woodwinds. The veiled graciousness then battles with a sense of mounting angst, ending with four brutal strokes on the timpani.
The second movement, Andante, begins in quiet pathos, quietly unfolding in the horn with a sense of loneliness, working through several variations before building into one of the most lyrical moments in the entire Symphony.

The third movement, Allegro giocoso, adds a more boisterous mood with the addition of lighthearted squeaks from the piccolo and triangle. The quick pace, catchy rhythms and thundering full-orchestra passages add an exuberant energy missing from the rest of the work.

The final movement, Allegro energico e passionate, begins with a repeating bass- line of almost raging force, developed into 32 exceptional variations ranging through a universe of conflicting emotions. After a series of ever-intensifying phrases, the work comes to one of the most uncompromisingly bleak but thrilling conclusions in the symphonic repertory, “storming to its tragic close.”

Program Notes by Karin Anderson-Sweet