The Program:


Rossini: Overture to Il Barbiere di Siviglia


Mozart: Clarinet Concerto


Mendelssohn: Symphony No. 4 "Italian"




The three compositions on today’s program may be instantly recognizable to today’s audience: To aficionados, these works by Mozart, Mendelssohn and Rossini are well-loved; and even to the most casual listener their melodies will likely be as familiar as a movie soundtrack or popular hymn or Tin Pan Alley standard.



There is a reason for that. Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto, Mendelssohn’s Italian Symphony, and Rossini’s Overture to The Barber of Seville are brilliant pieces of music that have endured through the past two centuries. They are glowing examples of their authors’ prowess, and they exemplify the transition in style from the Classical period, 1750-1810, to the Romantic, 1810-1900.



Only 42 years separate the Clarinet Concerto (1791) and Italian Symphony (1833) -- with Rossini’s Overture (1816) almost squarely between them -- and yet each is indicative of the stylistic period in which it was written.



The lineage of composers in this time frame starts with Haydn and moves to Mozart and then Mendelssohn. Mozart was the last prince of the Classical age, a musical period known for its embrace of reason and orderliness – tradition and accepted standards of beauty over, perhaps, innovation, but sheer genius nonetheless. Although Mendelssohn would become known as a Romantic stylist, celebrating personal expression, the individual, and extra-musical connotations, he was forever classical in his restraint and formal execution. Mozart and Mendelssohn have more in common than not.



This is the Age of Enlightenment, when society begins to move away from the established teachings of the church – the church as authority – and toward individual expression, to rationality and logic over superstition and custom. Insurgents overcame the Bastille two years before Mozart wrote the Clarinet Concerto, marking the beginning of the French Revolution; the American Revolution was already 10 years old. The middle class was ascending, and the monied bastions of the establishment – once patrons of composers – were being replaced by the self-supporting artist. In addition to traditional patronage, composers were paying their own way based on their income from public concerts, which were becoming more frequent – and being frequented by a much bigger audience willing to pay for the privilege.



The triumphs of the Classical period are the symphony as a form of music and the symphony orchestra as an ensemble. Next to Haydn, the father of the modern symphony, there was no greater composer for symphony orchestra than Mozart, who wrote 41 symphonies in a 27-year period. The Romantic period gave us the conductor – the musician and/or composer who doubled as the leader of a symphony orchestra. Mendelssohn was known in his time as not only a brilliant composer but brilliant conductor and music director as well.



The lives and careers of Mozart and Mendelssohn, giants of their time, ran along parallel lines; indeed, Mendelssohn was meant to be the next Mozart. Both were child prodigies, both died in their 30s. Both circulated in the highest echelons of society – composer as celebrity – although Mendelssohn was born to it, while Mozart moved in those circles as, essentially, paid entertainment and staff. Both worked hard and were amazingly prolific.



And along with Rossini, they were also amazingly facile writers. All three made those now-familiar notes of the Clarinet Concerto, the Italian Symphony, The Barber of Seville Overture, seem easy. The melodies drift off the page as naturally as the well-worn language of our national anthem or other song learned in childhood.



That is what makes these works by these three composers iconic and the definition of what it means to say that a composition is late Classical or early Romantic.

Overture to Il Barbiere di Siviglia by Gioacchino Rossini



While originally intended as an introduction to a longer work, typically an opera or ballet, an overture is often strong enough to stand alone as a concert piece – and, indeed, is sometimes the most well-known section of a composition. In the hands of a genius like Rossini, the operatic overture became one of the most popular musical forms.



Rossini could toss off a composition in a matter of days; the complete opera, The Barber of Seville is rumored to have been written in just under two weeks, although some scholars believe it likely to have been closer to two months. (The overture is actually recycled from a less successful opera Aureliano in Palmira.) Regardless, the piece caught the imagination of its first audiences with its wit and virtuosity and cemented the young Rossini’s reputation as a star.



The story of Figaro, the “barber of Seville,” perfectly illustrates the social upheaval of the time: the servant Figaro bests his masters. The opera is, essentially, the prelude to the plot of Mozart’s masterpiece “The Marriage of Figaro,” which comes to Wattenbarger Auditorium for the Bryan Symphony Orchestra’s November performance.

Clarinet Concerto in A Major, K.622 by W.A. Mozart



Some musicologists describe a concerto as a passionate dialogue between the might of a multi-piece orchestra and the brilliance of a soloist playing a single instrument. The term itself derives from the Latin “concertare” which has two meanings: to dispute and to work together. Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto is one of the most famous of this form.



A late arrival in the symphony orchestra, the clarinet was championed by Mozart, who once wrote, “Alas, if only we had more clarinets.” He wrote often for Austrian Anton Stadler, who played the rare basset clarinet, which boasted a wider (and lower) range than the standard instrument of the day.



This particular piece was among the last works Mozart completed before his death. The “inner,” or second, movement – ensconced most recently in the popular consciousness by its inclusion in the soundtrack of Sydney Pollack’s Out of Africa (1985) – is quiet and peaceful, but the last movement, the Rondo, is typically cheerful, which flies in the face of those who portray Mozart’s final years as dark, even grim. There’s no evidence that Mozart knew he was dying; to the contrary, Mozart was writing a piece for a good friend and a new work for a new instrument. Here was Mozart at his most mature, writing in the forefront of the day’s style.

Symphony No. 4, "Italian" by Felix Mendelssohn



That Mendelssohn’s Italian Symphony endures is an expression of its worth. Mendelssohn’s reputation underwent a vehement attack after his death and remained in shadow until the middle of the 20th century. We celebrate the 200th anniversary of Mendelssohn’s birth this year, but the date would likely go unnoticed if it were up to composer and music critic Richard Wagner, who almost singlehandedly relegated the Jewish-born Mendelssohn to a second tier of composers in the Romantic period. Wagner was dismissive of the work of any Jew; his anti-Semitism (unfortunately, not untypical for his time) echoed down through history until it reached its apotheosis in Hitler’s Germany. Since that time, music critics and directors have steadily rehabilitated Mendelssohn, hoisting him back up to deserved status.



Mendelssohn wrote only four symphonies; unlike Mozart, he wasn’t writing “occasional” music, or music for a specific occasion; Mendelssohn was writing for posterity. He personifies the Romantic period in music, and he was deeply influenced by literature; and three of his four symphonies – the Scottish, the Reformation and the Italian -- are based on extra-musical associations. The Italian is a reflection of Mendelssohn’s impressions of the land following the grand tour of his youth; the music is sunny and vivacious, just as Mendelssohn saw the Italian people. Its slow movement contains a “walking motif” mimicking the sounds of a pilgrimage, that methodic stride -- perhaps to the great cathedrals of Rome or Florence -- by the faithful. The final movement is based on the salterello, a spritely Italian dance.



The beauty of the Italian Symphony is only one of Mendelssohn’s contributions. As a conductor and music director, he worked to improve musical standards. His concert hall, the Gewandhaus in Leipzig, was a place of resonance; it was here that Mendelssohn staged a revival of Bach’s music after nearly a century – an irony, as it turned out, considering that Mendelssohn’s reputation would also suffer for roughly 100 years.







Notes by Laura Clemons and Dan Allcott
July 9, 2009