Composers Datebook

Coming of age in the first half of the 20th century were two exceptionally talented children of the wealthy Austrian steel magnate Karl Wittgenstein: Ludwig Wittgenstein became a famous philosopher and Paul Wittgenstein a concert pianist.

Paul served in the Austrian army in World War I, and, for a concert pianist, suffered a horrific injury: the loss of his right arm. Undaunted, he rebuilt his career by commissioning and performing works for piano left-hand. The family fortune enabled him to commission the leading composers of his day, including Richard Strauss, Maurice Ravel, and Sergei Prokofiev.

Unfortunately, even the Wittgenstein fortune couldn’t protect the family from the racial laws of Nazi Germany, given the family’s Jewish heritage, and, in 1938, Paul Wittgenstein left for the United States after Austria’s “Anschluss” with the German Reich.

In America, Paul Wittgenstein commissioned a concert work from a young British expatriate named Benjamin Britten, also living in America at the time, and gave the premiere performance of Britten’s “Diversions” for piano left-hand and orchestra on today’s date in 1942, with the Philadelphia Orchestra under Eugene Ormandy. Wittgenstein later confessed that of all his commissions, Britten’s work came the closest to fulfilling his needs and wishes.

“Das Rheingold” is the opening work in a 4-opera cycle, Wagner titled “The Ring of the Nibelungen.” No pun intended, but one of the most striking moments in that opera occurs when the Norse gods Wotan and Loge descend to Nibelheim, where the poor race of Nibelung dwarfs are toiling away under the spell of Alberich, a fellow dwarf possessing a magic gold ring of incredible power – but bearing a terrible curse.

Maybe the battery of tuned anvils heard in that scene sparked the imagination of the American composer Christopher Rouse in response to a commission from percussion virtuoso Evelyn Glennie, since the work he wrote for her, which premiered on today’s date in 1998, was titled “Der gerettete Alberich (or, “Alberich Saved”), subtitled "a fantasy for percussion and orchestra on themes of Wagner."

“Rather than a concerto,” said Rouse, “[it’s] a fantasy … on themes of Wagner, with the soloist taking on the ‘role’ of Alberich. Much of the material in the work is derived from Wagner’s motifs associated with Alberich, among them the motifs for the curse, the power of gold, the renunciation of love, annihilation, the Nibelungs, and, of course, the Ring itself.”

On today’s date in 1932, an all-Ravel concert was given in Paris by the Lamoureux Orchestra at the Salle Erard. Ravel himself was on hand, conducting some of his own works, including the premiere of his new Piano Concerto in G Major with pianist Marguerite Long the soloist.

The critics were enthusiastic about the music, but less so about Ravel’s conducting skills.

“Once again,” wrote one, “I wish to protest against the habit, more and more frequently indulged in, of attempting at all costs to bring a composer before the public in a part which he is incapable of filling. Monsieur Ravel is continually brought out as a pianist or as a conductor, whilst he cannot shine in either of these two specialties... His Pavane was unutterably slow, his Bolero dry and badly timed, and the accompaniment of the concerto lacked clarity and elasticity... But there can only be praise for the composer of all these delicate, subtle works, the orchestration of which abounds in amusing and profound inventions... The new concerto,” concludes the review, “is worthy of the other masterpieces we owe to Ravel.”

Late in 1941, the Russian composer Igor Stravinsky was living in Hollywood – at 1260 North Wetherly Drive, to be precise.

Notoriously unflappable, and eminently practical when it came to commissions, Stravinsky apparently did not even bat an eye when he received a phone call from the choreographer Georges Balanchine with an offer from Barnum’s Circus to write a short musical work for a ballet involving elephants. Again, to be precise, for Barnum’s star elephant ballerina named Modoc, who would be accompanied by fifty other elephants and dancers, all in tutus.

“For what?” Stravinsky asked.

“For elephants,” said Balanchine.

“How many?” countered Stravinsky.

“A lot,” replied Balanchine.

“How old?” asked Stravinsky.

“Young,” assured Balanchine.

”Well, if they’re young, I accept,” concluded Stravinsky.

Stravinsky’s work, entitled “Circus Polka,” had its debut at Madison Square Garden in New York by the Barnum Circus, and was performed by what Stravinsky once called their “respectable quadrupeds” some 400 times. Stravinsky then arranged his “Circus Polka” for symphony orchestra and conducted the premiere of that version (minus the elephants) with the Boston Symphony in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on today’s date in 1944.

Like everyone else, young composers indulge in daydreams from time to time. One can easily imagine a 15-year-old composer wanna-be staring out the window and fantasizing that one day her music will be performed by big-name virtuosos and heard coast-to-coast on a national broadcast.

That is exactly what did happen on today’s date in 2002, when the 15-year-old composer Athena Adamopoulos heard Yo-Yo Ma and Christopher O’Riley perform her “Soliloquy” for cello and piano at a taping of “From the Top” – a nationally broadcast public radio program that showcases young classical musicians from around the country. Occasionally, the show also spotlights young composers as well, as it did the day Yo-Yo Ma stopped by as a special guest.

Athena commented, “When I heard the piece in my head originally, I heard it something like this, but this is about ten times better! It’s the most touching feeling in the world.”

Even at 15, Athena was already a somewhat “experienced” composer. She had written several other chamber works by that date, and had actually performed one of her very first pieces on the “Sally Jesse Raphael” TV show, when she was just 8.

In 1953, the Louisville Orchestra was awarded a Rockefeller Foundation grant of $500,000 to commission, premiere, and record 20th-century music to be issued on their own label, Louisville First Edition Records. By 1997 they had released nearly 150 discs, containing more than 450 compositions by living composers.

On today’s date in 1980, one of the Louisville commissions premiered and recorded by the Orchestra was “Tournaments ” by the then 41-year old American composer John Corigliano.

“As the title implies,” writes Corigliano, “’Tournaments’ is a ‘contest piece,’ a sort of mini-Concerto for Orchestra in which first desk players and entire sections vie with each other in displaying their virtuosity.”

The Louisville Orchestra received many awards for their ambitious commissioning project, while composer John Corigliano went on to win Grammys and an Oscar, not to mention the Grawemeyer and Pulitzer Prizes for Music.

Corigliano is also proud of his teaching positions at the Juilliard School and Lehman College in New York. “I think it’s good for a composer to teach,” says Corigliano, “because you always have new students, and you have to begin at the beginning and make things clear.”

Today, we note two anniversaries concerning Handel and his music in London.

On today’s date in 1710, the German-born composer’s music was performed in London for the very first time when excerpts from his opera “Rodrigo” were used as incidental music during a revival of Ben Jonson’s comic play “The Alchemist,” written 100 years earlier.

It’s a nice historical touch that in addition to writing satirical comedies like “The Alchemist,” Ben Jonson had supplied the poetic texts for elaborate masques staged at the court of King James the First. Masques were a kind of precursor of the lavish Baroque operas like Handel’s “Rodrigo” which debuted in Italy just three years before its tunes were recycled for use on the British stage.

By 1713, the vogue for Italian operas had reached London, and Handel himself was on hand to write and stage them. On today’s date in 1713, Handel’s opera “Teseo” had its premiere at the Queen’s Theater in London. And, just to show that off-stage events could prove every bit as dramatic as those on-stage, the theater manager, a certain Owen Swiney, ran off to Italy with the box office receipts after the second night’s performance!

In the musical world, there are many creative people with innovative ideas, but far fewer with the ability and persistence to raise the funds necessary to realize their visions.

Today, a tip of the hat to the late American composer John Duffy, who, in 1982, was President of Meet the Composer, an organization which secured funding from the National Endowment for the Arts and other foundations for a large-scale residency program that paired rising American composers with major American orchestras. The composers included John Corigliano, Joan Tower, Stephen Paulus, Christopher Rouse, Libby Larsen, and Alvin Singleton. Each wrote special works for their orchestras, works which were premiered and recorded as part of the program – a major career boost for any young composer.

For example, Alvin Singleton was the composer chosen for the Atlanta residency, and on today’s date in 1988, that orchestra premiered his score entitled “After Fallen Crumbs.”

The unusual title doesn’t refer to arts funding, however apt that may seem, but derives from an earlier choral piece by Singleton, whose text dealt with world hunger, and closed with the lines, “An ant can feed a family with the fallen crumbs of an elephant.”

Today’s date marks the birthday in 1937 of the American composer Robert Moran. A native of Denver, Moran studied in Berkley with Darius Milhaud and Luciano Berio and in Vienna with Hans Apostel, a pupil of Schoenberg and Berg.

It was in Vienna that Moran overheard an unfamiliar waltz and was surprised to learn that Austrian composers were still writing them. Intrigued, Moran wrote one himself and asked 24 other contemporary composers to write more for “The Waltz Project,” a collection recorded as a Nonesuch LP in 1980 and later choreographed by the New York City Ballet.

Moran’s catalog of works includes a choral setting of “Winni Ille Pu,” a classical Latin translation of “Winnie the Pooh,” and a “Lunchbag Opera,” scored for performers hidden in adult-size brown lunch bags, each armed with toy noise-makers to be played while strolling through—according to Moran’s instructions—“any important financial district or banking center at lunch time”

One of Moran’s recent large-scale works from 2012 is entitled “The Game of the Antichrist,” based on a medieval mystery play from Bavaria. It’s scored for children’s chorus, adult vocalists, organ, and a small ensemble that includes an alpine horn and cocktail bar piano.

A remarkable shift of focus in music history occurred in the latter part of the 20th Century when performers and musicologists began turning their attention to neglected works by women composers of the past and present. Composers like Hildegard von Bingen, Clara Schumann, Amy Beach, Rebecca Clarke, and Florence Price began to receive the attention they deserved.

In the 21st century, much work remains to be done on this front, however.

Take the case of Monserrate Ferrer Otero, also known as Monsita Ferrer, born in San Juan on this date in 1885. She began playing the piano at an early age, and later pursued composition studies in New York. She was one of Puerto Rico’s first professional woman composers and in 1956 served as an advisor in the planning of their Conservatory of Music. Although enjoying success during her lifetime, only a handful of her works are still performed today. This slow waltz, titled "Bajo el Oro del Crepúsculo” (or, “Under the Gold of Twilight”) was dedicated to fellow travelers aboard the luxury liner Victoria Luisa.

A string quartet and most of her other vocal and piano works remain unpublished long after Monserrate Ferrer Otero‘s death in 1966.