Synopsis

Two concert overtures — one very famous and one not so famous — had their premiere performances on today's date.

In 1956, this music by British composer Arthur Bliss provided a festive opening to that year’s Edinburgh Festival of Music and Drama. The Edinburgh Festival Overture is a salute to Scotland's premiere arts festival, presented annually in late summer and early fall since 1947.

Also premiered on today’s date was Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture, commissioned for an international Exhibition of Industry and the Arts in Moscow, and first played at an all-Tchaikovsky concert on today’s date in 1882. As pleased as Tchaikovsky was that his music was to be presented at the Exhibition, he was definitely not enthusiastic about the commission.

“There is nothing less to my liking than composing for the sake of some festival. What, for instance, can you write on the occasion of the opening of an exhibition except banalities and generally noisy passages?” he wrote. On top of all that, the commission called for something “with a hint of church music, which must certainly be Orthodox.”

Glumly, Tchaikovsky to work, writing to another friend: “I don't think it has any serious merits, and I shouldn’t be at all surprised and offended if you find that it is in a style unsuitable for symphony concerts.”

Ah, Peter Ilyich — you certainly got that one wrong!

Music Played in Today's Program

Arthur Bliss (1891-1975): Edinburgh Overture; City of Birmingham Symphony; Vernon Handley, conductor; EMI Classics 69388

Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893): 1812 Overture; Kirov Orchestra; Valery Gergiev, conductor; Phillips 442 011