PROGRAM NOTES
THE FANTASTIC SYMPHONY
FROM THE PODIUM by Catherine Case
When I learned that this season is focusing on music that awakens our senses , I immediately thought of Jonathan Harvey ’ s … towards a pure land . Harvey ’ s music is still quite underplayed in the US , and I find this piece so captivating , powerful , and simple in the absolute best way , I really wanted to share it here . He creates exquisite space for introspection , like a beautiful garden . He takes us by the hand , opens the gate , and leaves us to wander around freely in our own imaginations and memories .
The Ravel is also an incredibly powerful piece that is rarely played . It represents the anxieties of coming out of World War I and trying to reconnect with a lighter spirit , but still being traumatized by the war . There is a heavy weight and darkness attached to this music , even in the jazzier moments .
It has been a while since this orchestra played Symphonie fantastique , and I jumped at the chance to bring this wild piece to Baltimore . If you think about the other music being written in 1830 , at the time this symphony premiered , you realize what a truly groundbreaking work it is and how it anticipated a modernism in music that happened 120 years later . This music allows itself to be passionate , to get carried away , to be distracted . If Berlioz were alive today , I think he would be drawing Marvel comics — he is so full of emotion and loved the idea of heroes saving the world !
This program is made up of works that were conceived within very different conditions , but to listen to all the sounds together , to really engage our senses , I think they make a beautiful aural landscape .
ABOUT THE PROGRAM
BY CATHERIN CASE
Jonathan Harvey
Born May 3 , 1939 in West Midlands , England Died December 4 , 2012 in East Sussex , England
… TOWARDS A PURE LAND [ 2012 ]
British composer Jonathan Harvey was steeped in music from an early age . As a young chorister at St . Michaels Tenbury , he sang two services a day and grew to love the English choral tradition and the idea of music as ritual . At home , his father , who was an amateur musician , exposed him to an eclectic range of music and piqued his interest in the avant-garde . By the age of six , Harvey knew he wanted to be a composer .
Harvey was an early pioneer of electronic music in the 1980s and one of the first composers to make use of the Paris-based research institute for music , science , and technology known as IRCAM . During this time , he also became a devoted practitioner of Buddhist meditation and eastern religion . Drawing on these disciplines , Harvey ’ s musical language reflects a profound exploration of both the physical and spiritual aspects of sonority .
… towards a pure land , written in 2005 , begins with a string ensemble hidden on stage that stays peacefully behind the full orchestra throughout the work . Harvey called this the Ensemble of Eternal Sound . Over this texture , the orchestra , full of shimmering percussion , fills the space with waves of activity that develop around a central point . In his own notes for the piece , Harvey explains it further : “ The center itself is not solid , rather it is an emptiness , an empty presence . There is sound but only insubstantial pitch …. ideas are fleeting : things arise , then cease , in an unending flow . To grasp them and fix them would be to distort them falsely .”
Harvey described the notion of a Pure Land as a “ state of mind beyond suffering where there is no grasping .” In Buddhist literature it is seen as a landscape and “ a model of the world to which we can aspire . Those who live there do not experience ageing , sickness or any other suffering . There is no poverty or fighting , and no danger from fire , water , wind or earth .… There are also gardens filled with heavenly flowers , bathing pools and exquisite jewels covering the ground which make it completely pure and smooth .”
Instrumentation Two flutes , piccolo , three oboes , two clarinets , bass clarinet , three bassoons , five horns , three trumpets , three trombones , tuba , timpani , percussion , harp , celesta , and strings .
Maurice Ravel
Born March 7 , 1875 in Ciboure , France Died December 28 , 1937 in Paris , France
PIANO CONCERTO IN D MAJOR FOR THE LEFT HAND [ 1930 ]
Maurice Ravel is one of the leading composers of Impressionism , a 19 th century movement inspired by French painters such as Monet
Maximilian Franz
24 OVERTURE / BSOmusic . org