GERSHWIN’ S PIANO CONCERTO
the second movement’ s themes and, in a spectacular conclusion, to the first movement’ s big romantic theme as well. The Concerto’ s last moments express the confidence of a young, vital America and the fearless young genius who gave it a voice all its own.
Instrumentation: Two flutes, piccolo, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, bass clarinet, two bassoons, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion and strings.
SYMPHONY NO. 2 IN C MAJOR
Robert Schumann
Born in Zwickau, Germany, June 8, 1810; died in Endenich, Germany, July 29, 1856
In February 1854 after decades of mental suffering, Robert Schumann attempted suicide by jumping from a bridge into the Rhine River. He spent the last two and a half years of his life in an asylum, where he died of self-starvation at age 46. In 1844, a decade before the suicide attempt, he endured the worst breakdown of his life subsequent to that catastrophic final one. Every effort exhausted him, and composing became a torment. Writing to a physician friend, he recalled:“ For a while I could not stand listening to music. It cut into my nerves like knives.” Schumann was
Marin Alsop leads the BSO tormented by phobias—“ melancholy bats,” he called them— including fears of high places, sharp objects and medicines, which he was convinced contained poisons. Worse still for a musician were auditory hallucinations, described by Clara Schumann as a“ constant singing and rushing in his ears, every noise would turn into a tone.”
Eventually, the symptoms lessened, Schumann began to grow stronger, and his creativity revived. First he completed his popular Piano Concerto. By December, he had entered one of his manic creative phases and in just three weeks sketched the Second Symphony, regarded by many as his greatest. It is easy to hear Schumann’ s struggle against his illness in this symphony, as well as the joyous return of health and strength in the finale. Through the alchemy of art, the composer managed to transform suffering into great music, especially in the extraordinary slow movement that is the emotional heart of this work.
The sonata-form first movement opens with a long and mysterious slow introduction that contains the seeds from which the symphony will grow. First we hear a solemn fanfare in the brass, distant and dreamlike, above strings wandering in a dark maze. The woodwinds offer a four-note rhythmic idea. When the tempo finally accelerates to Allegro, this motive launches the movement’ s main theme, full of nervous struggle. Periodically, the violins arc upward on a tormented wailing idea, which eventually grows into a new lyrical episode for woodwinds and violins.
More agitated still is the secondmovement scherzo with its fast, frenetic music for the violins. So difficult is this to play that it is customarily included in auditions for violinists seeking an orchestral position. Momentary relief from this obsessive music comes in two trio sections: the first a dialogue between woodwinds and strings; the second a lovely, flowing episode, rich in fugal imitation and opened by the strings. A loud return of movement one’ s brass fanfare closes the movement.
For the slow movement in C minor, Schumann created one of the most heartbreakingly beautiful melodies in the symphonic repertoire. Moving from one woodwind instrument to another, it seems to grow lovelier and more painful with each repetition. When the violins sing the melody, they twice add a chain of shimmering trills— a sublime stroke.
With an upward-rushing scale and a joyous wake-up-call of a theme in the woodwinds, Schumann seems to bound from his sickbed. The finale is the musical expression of the composer’ s recovery, with no lingering dark shadows. Listen for the reappearance of the slow movement’ s poignant theme in the low strings, now dancing along in quick tempo. Schumann eventually turns it upside down, creating a buoyant new tune that drives the music forward for several moments. Yet another melody is introduced by the woodwinds: a soaring and uncomplicated hymn of thanksgiving. So infectious is this melody that Schumann forgets all the others and builds the symphony’ s conclusion around this uplifting music. At the end, the opening brass fanfare reappears, transformed into triumph.
Instrumentation: Two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets, three trombones, timpani and strings.
Notes by Janet E. Bedell, © 2018
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