Composers Datebook

On today's date in 1842, an orchestra of 63 players performed Beethoven's Symphony No. 5 at the first concert of the Philharmonic Society of New York. This 1842 performance of Beethoven's Fifth occurred 34 years after the work's premiere in Vienna in 1808.

One early and avid Philharmonic Society fan was George Templeton Strong, a young New York lawyer who recorded this appraisal of the symphony after another Philharmonic Society performance of Beethoven's Fifth in 1844:

"The first movement, with its abrupt opening, the complicated entanglement of harmonies that makes up the rest of it, is not very satisfactory or intelligible to me as a whole, though it abounds in exquisite little scraps of melody that come sparkling out like stars through a cloudy sky... but the second and fourth movements—the third ain't much—are enough to put Beethoven at the head of all instrumental composers if he'd never written another note."

In 1865, Strong became the President of the Philharmonic Society, and founded the Church Music Association, which presented sacred choral compositions by leading European composers. George Tempelton Strong's diaries are a fascinating record of life in New York City during the 19th century. Entries from Strong's diaries were quoted frequently as part of the Ken and Ric Burns' PBS television documentaries on the American Civil War and the history of New York City.

Today marks the anniversary of the birth of the American composer and pianist Dave Brubeck. Born in Concord, California on December 6th, 1920, Dave Brubeck would become one of the most famous jazz performers of our time—and one of the most successful at fusing elements of jazz and classical music.

Brubeck studied with Schoenberg and Milhaud, and in the late 1940's and '50's formed a jazz quartet incorporating Baroque-style counterpoint and unusual time signatures into a style that came to be known as "West Coast" or "cool" jazz, culminating in the 1960 release of a landmark jazz album for Columbia Records titled "Time Out." This album produced two Hit Parade singles: "Blue Rondo à la Turk" and "Take Five." Ironically, Brubeck had to fight to convince Columbia to release an album composed totally of original material with no familiar "standards" to help sales!

In addition to works for chamber-sized jazz combos, Brubeck has written a number of large-scale sacred works, among them a 1975 Christmas Choral Pageant titled "La Fiesta de la Posada," or, "The Festival of the Inn."

Originally written to celebrate the restoration of a Spanish mission in California, it wound up being premiered in Hawaii by the Honolulu Symphony. Since its premiere, "La Fiesta de la Posada" has been performed by both professional and amateur ensembles, ranging from symphony orchestras to mariachi bands. Its premiere recording was made by the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra and the Dale Warland Singers, with Dennis Russell Davies conducting.

The first performance of a landmark musical work of the Romantic period, the "Symphonie fantastique" of Berlioz, took place on today's date in 1830, at the Paris Conservatory.

"Symphonie fantastique" was inspired by the composer's infatuation with an English Shakespearean actress, Harriet Smithson. When she ignored him, Berlioz wrote his "Fantastic" symphony as a musical depiction of his stormy passion for the charismatic red-haired actress, who is transformed via the musical theme from an ideal vision of beauty into a nightmarish participant in a Witches' Sabbath. It's a wild and colorful symphonic trip.

As with any such groundbreaking work, early opinions were divided. Franz Liszt attended the premiere and was so impressed that he became Berlioz's friend and even prepared a solo piano transcription of the symphony. Paganini was bowled over and asked Berlioz to write something for him. On the other hand, the conservative director of the Paris Conservatory, Luigi Cherubini, uncomfortable with the radical new style of Berlioz, refused to attend, commenting: "I don't need to be taught how NOT to write music."

The reaction of the first night audience was mostly positive, and Berlioz wrote in his Memoirs that the movement titled "March to the Scaffold" was especially well received. He also claimed that he wrote this march in a single night—but that claim, like the whole symphony, may be a bit "fantastic. "

Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto was first performed on today's date in 1881. The premiere took place in Vienna with Adolf Brodsky the violin soloist and the Vienna Philharmonic led by Hans Richter. It was not a big hit. The next day, the conservative Viennese critic Eduard Hanslick wrote: "The violin is no longer played: it is tugged about, torn, beaten black and blue." According to Hanslick, the concerto's finale (quote): "transports us to the brutal and wretched jollity of a Russian festival. We see gross and savage faces, hear crude curses, and smell the booze... Tchaikovsky's Concerto confronts us for the first time with the hideous idea that there may be musical compositions whose stink one can hear." Ouch! Tchaikovsky's score survived the bad review, but a more recent American work suffered a far unkinder cut. The original film score for the 1968 blockbuster movie, "2001: A Space Odyssey" was written by Alex North, who was born in Chester, Pennsylvania on today's date in 1910. North was hired by director Stanley Kubrick to write the music for "2001," but Kubrick ultimately decided to use pre-recorded classical and contemporary music instead. When North attended the New York premiere of "2001," he was devastated that not one minute of the music he had written was included in the final edit. Believe it or not, no one had informed him in advance!

It was wet and cold in New York on today's date in 1925, but a curious crowd gathered at Carnegie Hall for a concert by the New York Symphony. Walter Damrosch was to conduct the world premiere of a new Piano Concerto by George Gershwin, who would also be the soloist.

The audience reacted with cheers and bravos, but the reviews were mixed: "Conventional, trite... [and] a little dull" was the verdict of one; but another was enthusiastic, suggesting: "Of all those writing the music of today, [Gershwin] alone actually expresses US." In the America of 1925, that "us" would have included the owners of speakeasies, raccoon coats, and Stutz Bearcat roadsters. It was the "Jazz Age"— an era magically captured in F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel "The Great Gatsby."

Seventy-four years later, in December of 1999, John Harbison's opera based on "The Great Gatsby" premiered at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, playing to sold-out houses. Once again, audiences were enthusiastic—the critics less so.

To capture the mood of the 1920s, Harbison had composed a number of original songs in Jazz-Age style, which he incorporated as themes in his opera. These tunes have even been published as a separate "Gatsby Songbook!"

Imagine: a modern opera with tunes audiences can actually hum as they leave the theater! What will they think of next?

On today's date in 1949, Northrop Auditorium in Minneapolis was the venue for the world premiere performance of Béla Bartók's last orchestral piece: his Concerto for Viola and Orchestra. The soloist was William Primrose, who had commissioned the work, with the Hungarian-born conductor Antal Dorati leading the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra.

Bartók had died in 1945, leaving extensive but incomplete sketches for the concerto he was writing for Primrose. After his death, the Viola Concerto was completed and orchestrated by Bartók's friend and fellow Hungarian, Tibor Sérly, who had also put the finishing touches on Bartók's Third Piano Concerto, which also premiered posthumously.

The 1949 premiere of the Viola Concerto in Minneapolis attracted worldwide attention. To the surprise of some, it also went over very well with its first-night audience at Northrop Auditorium.

At the dress rehearsal, Dorati had predicted as much: "This is one time the audience need have no qualms about the word 'contemporary' as applied to the music it's about to hear." Dorati's view was that the public was finally catching up with Bartók's highly original idiom. "It's not a case of a composer becoming famous because he is dead," said Dorati. "It is true there has been a great surge of performances of Bartók's music since his death, but that is because the public was ready to hear his music."

Because it's often played at weddings, the "Trumpet Voluntary" is one piece of Baroque music that just about everyone has heard. Once attributed to the famous 17th century British composer Henry Purcell, this music was, in fact, composed by Purcell's slightly younger and not-so-famous contemporary Jeremiah Clarke.

Clarke was born around 1674 and sang as a boy soprano in London's Chapel Royal. After his voice changed, he became a choir director and rejoined the Chapel Royal as an organist in 1700. Tragically, on December 1st in 1707, Clarke shot himself – according to some contemporary accounts as the result of a hopeless love affair.

And speaking of such things: also on today's date—in 1886—the American premiere of "Tristan und Isolde," Richard Wagner's classic opera of ill-fated passion, took place at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. Anton Seidl, a protégé of Wagner, conducted. While composing Tristan, Wagner wrote to his lover, Mathilde Wesendonck: "Child! This Tristan is turning into something fearsome... the opera will probably be banned... only mediocre performances can save me! Good performances will drive people mad!"

If not driven mad, American audiences in 1886 were at least remarkably enthusiastic. The Musical Courier reported that "the audience filled every available seat and listened to the performance, which lasted until nearly midnight, with an attention and genuine enthusiasm unequaled in the musical history of this land."

On today's date in 1885, the Paris Opera gave the first performance of "Le Cid," the 11th opera written by the French composer Jules Massenet.

"Le Cid" is set in medieval Spain and tells the story of Rodrigo Diaz de Bivar, a legendary hero who defended his country against the Moors. The same story inspired a 1961 movie titled "El Cid," starring—who else?—Charlton Heston.

But back in 1890, Massenet's version of "El Cid" was introduced to American audiences by the New Orleans Opera and reached New York in 1897, serving as a vocal showcase for turn-of-the-century superstars of the early Metropolitan Opera. The great Enrico Caruso later made a famous recording of the opera's most famous excerpt—Rodrigo's Act III aria, "O souverain, o juge, o pere," which translates as "Oh Lord, Oh Judge, Oh Father."

Unlikely as it may seem, this aria inspired a pop hit in 1981, when composer and performance artist Laurie Anderson translated its opening line as "O Superman, O Judge, O Mom and Dad." As a credit to the French composer, Laurie Anderson's "O Superman" is even subtitled "For Massenet."

Trained as a classical violinist with the Chicago Youth Symphony, Laurie Anderson soon shifted to a variety of electronically-altered fiddles, and one of her albums is titled, appropriately, "Life on a String."

It was on this date in 1825 that the United States had its first date with authentic Italian opera. This was a performance of Gioacchino Rossini's "The Barber of Seville," staged at New York City's Park Theater.

The production's singers were drawn mostly from one extraordinary Spanish family—the Garcias—led by its patriarch Manuel Garcia, a tenor renowned in Europe for his clarion voice and ornamental dexterity. Garcia himself, naturally, sang the lead tenor role of Count Almaviva—it was a role he had created at the opera's premiere in Rome nine years earlier, and was specially written for him.

The 1825 New York audience included luminaries from society and the arts—including the American novelist James Fenimore Cooper and Mozart's one-time librettist, Lorenzo da Ponte, who was teaching Italian at Columbia University in those days.

November 29th is also important to 20th century American musical theater. Cole Porter's "Gay Divorce" opened on Broadway on November 29, 1932, at the Ethel Barrymore Theater in New York City.

The musical's title rankled censors who feared it treated divorce too lightly, and they insisted on converting it to the less controversial "Gay Divorcee." Cole Porter's score included one of his classic songs, "Night and Day"… and, like Rossini before him, Porter claimed to have tailor-made this song for the unusual tenor star of HIS new show, one Fred Astaire.

According to the historians, the 19th Century was the great age of Romanticism—but tell that to Sergei Rachmaninoff and Howard Hanson! On today's date, two of their quintessentially Romantic works were premiered—and both occurred firmly in the 20th century.

In 1909, Rachmaninoff came to the U.S. for his first American tour, and on today's date appeared as the piano soloist in the world premiere of his Third Piano Concerto with the New York Symphony. Now, if the film "Shine" is to be believed, "Rach 3" is one of the most difficult of all Romantic piano concertos—and the truth is that even Rachmaninoff found himself practicing it on the boat to America just before its 1909 premiere.

By 1930, when American composer Howard Hanson's Symphony No. 2 premiered on today's date in Boston, Romantic music was increasingly considered "old fashioned." But Hanson defiantly subtitled his new Symphony the "Romantic."

"As the subtitle implies," wrote Hanson, "my Symphony represents a definite embracing of the Romantic phase. I recognize, of course, that Romanticism is, at the present time, music's poor stepchild… Nevertheless, I embrace her all the more fervently, believing as I do that Romanticism will find in this country rich soil for new growth."

And how about outer space? Decades after its premiere, Hanson's popular "Romantic" Symphony even showed up as part of the film score to the sci-fi classic "Alien!"