Villa-Lobos, Montag, & Schubert

Villa-Lobos, Montag, & Schubert

This concert is sold out. Please contact Lori Hopkinson at lori@bowdoinfestival.org or 207-373-1400 to be placed on a waiting list. Concert also livestreamed at bowdoinfestival.org/festivalive

‬

‭HEITOR VILLA-LOBOS‬‭
‭Sonata for Cello and Piano No. 2, Op. 66‬

‭I. Allegro moderato‬
‭II. Andante cantabile‬
‭III. Scherzo. Allegro scherzando‬
‭IV. Allegro vivace sostenuto

Denise Djokic, cello • Tao Lin, piano‬

VILMOS MONTAG
Sonata for Contrabass and Piano in E Minor‬

‭I. Allegro moderato‬
‭II. Andante‬
‭III. Allegro‬

Jeremy McCoy, bass • Pei-Shan Lee, piano‬

FRANZ SCHUBERT
‭Piano Quintet in A Major, Op. 114, D. 667, “The Trout”

‭I. Allegro vivace‬
‭II. Andante‬
‭III. Scherzo. Presto — Trio‬
‭IV. Theme. Andantino — Variazioni. Allegretto‬
‭V. Finale. Allegro giusto‬

Mikhail Kopelman, violin • Liz Freivogel, viola‬ • Edward Arron, cello • Jeremy McCoy, bass‬
‭Elinor Freer, piano‬
‭

HEITOR VILLA-LOBOS
Sonata for Cello and Piano No. 2, Op. 66 (1916)

Heitor Villa-Lobos is recognized as a defining composer of Brazilian concert music, whose work creatively combined European modernism with Brazilian traditions in the widest sense. He borrowed ecumenically from urban popular genres, including Iberian and Afro-Brazilian dances; he drew inspiration from musical instruments used by indigenous groups of central Brazil; and he imitated the complex soundscapes of the Amazon and its diverse fauna. These seemingly eclectic elements coalesce into lush avant-garde tapestries, exemplified in his series of fifteen Chôros (1920–1929) or Bachianas Brasileiras (1930–1945), either of which provide a wonderful panorama of this unique composer’s œuvre, which by some tallies comprises over two thousand works.

Villa-Lobos’s fluency and prolificity are due in part to a disciplined and immersive musical upbringing initiated by his father, Raul, an amateur cellist. Raul’s unexpected death in 1899 left the Villa-Lobos family in a precarious position; Heitor helped support his mother and siblings by playing cello and guitar in bands wherever he could — restaurants, cinemas, vaudevilles, and the like. As he entered adulthood, he continued performing popular and concert music in tandem: he kept himself apprised of recent trends in French music, and taught himself advanced sonata techniques by reading the composition treatise of prominent French pedagogue Vincent d’Indy, which he acquired in 1914. He immediately put these techniques to the test, composing two violin sonatas and two cello sonatas in 1915–16, which share more in common with European trends of the time than the Brazilian inspirations that he embraced elsewhere.

D’Indy’s imprint is especially palpable in the Second Sonata for Cello and Piano, most notably in the “cyclical” construction, whereby themes from the first movement return, transformed, in the Finale — a sonata-technique practiced by composers since Haydn and Beethoven, but more systematically codified in d’Indy’s pedagogy. The Sonata was premiered in Rio de Janeiro, with Heitor’s wife and creative partner, Lucília Guimarães Villa-Lobos, at the piano.

VILMOS MONTAG
Sonata for Contrabass and Piano in E Minor (1967)

Very little documentation exists pertaining to the life and work of Hungarian composer Vilmos Montag. Born in Budapest, Montag studied violin, conducting, and composition, obtaining positions in the city’s opera and philharmonic orchestras upon graduation. He remained in Budapest through the Second World War. Following the brutally repressed Hungarian Revolution of 1956, however, Montag emigrated, like many Hungarians, eventually settling in Sweden where he remained for the rest of his life. 

Somewhat more is known about his brother, Lajos Montag (1906–1997): like Vilmos, Lajos began his musical training on the violin, but, following slow progress (and a growth spurt), he switched to the double bass. As a bassist, Lajos emerged as a pioneer: in addition to his own positions in the Budapest orchestras, he tapped the underexploited potential of the double bass as a solo instrument, touring widely and producing an important five-volume pedagogical method of double bass performance.

Vilmos Montag’s compositional output is modest: the Sonata for Contrabass and Piano is without doubt his most famous work, due in part to the paucity of sonatas written for this instrument. It is no surprise that Vilmos dedicated the Sonata to his brother, who remained in Hungary even after Vilmos relocated to Sweden. The wide range of idiomatic techniques suggests that Vilmos received wise counsel during the compositional process — perhaps from Lajos himself. One of the most obvious particularities is the scordatura tuning: the bassist retunes the three higher strings up by a tone. As a result, the A-string, tuned to B, produces a resonant open-string pedal-tone on the key of the dominant, put to great effect in the opening pages. The upper range of the instrument is not neglected, either, with extended passages requiring the bassist to play in thumb position.

FRANZ SCHUBERT
Piano Quintet in A Major, Op. 114, D. 667, “The Trout” (1819)

The “Trout” Quintet reminds us that during his lifetime, and even after, Schubert was best known as a composer of Lieder (songs) — a reputation which long prevented his many larger-scale works from being taken seriously. Schubert’s songwriting was indeed prodigious: he composed more than 600 in his short lifetime, including more than 300 between 1815 and 1817, often managing several in a day. His song “Die Forelle” (“The Trout”), composed in 1817, was instantly popular, apparently widely known throughout his hometown of Vienna. Perhaps part of its success was due to its sheer affability: the song begins with a delightful tune and a bubbly piano part, setting part of a poem written by Christian Friedrich Daniel Schubart in 1782, in which a fisherman spots a trout in a stream. The music turns somewhat darker for the third stanza, when the fisherman stirs the waters muddy and manages to reel in the elusive fish. 

In 1819, Schubert spent the summer away from Vienna in the town of Steyr, where he met Sylvester Paumgartner. Paumgartner, a patron and amateur cellist, regularly invited guests to his salon for chamber music sessions, of which Schubert was a frequent visitor. Paumgartner was familiar with and keenly fond of “Die Forelle,” and asked if Schubert would be willing to extrapolate the song into a chamber work, suggesting Hummel’s Quintet of the same instrumentation (as yet unpublished) as a model. Schubert accepted the suggestion, composing a quintet that resembles a Classical serenade in its five-movement structure and lighthearted tone. He excerpted the first verse of the song — the part before the fisherman manages to catch the trout — and expanded it into the Theme and Variations that became the Quintet’s fourth movement. In the final variation, he even incorporates the distinct, limpid sextuplet figurations from the piano part of the song, which brings the movement to a delicate conclusion before the work’s contrasting, dance-like Finale.

Program Notes by Peter Asimov