Composers Datebook

An old music dictionary’s definition of “nocturne” reads as follows: “A night piece, a musical composition that suggests a nocturnal atmosphere, for example Haydn’s Notturno or Mozart’s Serenata Notturna, but more specifically a short piece of romantic character. First to use this title for this genre was John Field, followed by Chopin.”

Hundreds of composers since Field and Chopin have tried their hand at writing nocturnes. This particular one was written for flute and guitar by Boston-based composer Daniel Pinkham, as part of a five-movement suite of nocturnes, all premiered on today’s date in 1993, at the First and Second Church in Boston.

Now, as any insomniac will tell you, there are all sorts of night moods, and the descriptive titles of Pinkham’s set of five Nocturnes ranges from the sprightly to the serene, with others titled “brooding,” “sultry” and “restless” tossed in for good measure.

Pinkham was particularly fortunate in his teachers. Imagine studying composition with Aaron Copland, Walter Piston and Samuel Barber, or harpsichord with Wanda Landowska and organ with E. Power Biggs. Pinkham did — and in turn became a successful teacher himself, with a long tenure at the New England Conservatory of Music. He served as music director of Boston’s historic King’s Chapel, and as a composer was particularly honored by his church musician colleagues for his many works for chorus and organ.

Daniel Pinkham (1923-2006): Nocturnes; Fenwick Smith, flute; David Leisner, guitar; Koch 7423

Today’s date marks the anniversary Richard Wagner’s birth. During Wagner’s lifetime, his most famous — and perhaps most perceptive — critic was Prague-born Viennese writer on music Eduard Hanslick.

Hanslick knew Wagner personally, and described him as follows: “A stranger would have seen in his face not so much an artistic genius as a dry Leipzig professor or lawyer. He spoke incredibly much — and fast — in a monotonous sing-song Saxon dialect and always of himself, his works, his reforms, his plans. If he mentioned the name of another composer it was always in a tone of disparagement.”

For Wagnerians, Hanslick was a crusty old conservative who preferred Brahms and was too thick-headed to appreciate the Music of the Future epitomized by Wagner’s operas. But if one actually reads Hanslick’s writings on Wagner, a more nuanced and balanced picture emerges.

“I know very well that Wagner is the greatest living opera composer and the only one in Germany worth talking about in a historical sense,” Hanslick wrote. “But between this admission and the repulsive idolatry which has grown up in connection with Wagner and which he has encouraged, there is an infinite chasm.”

Upon learning of Wagner’s death in 1883, Hanslick wrote: “Wagner stands at the head of the moving forces of modern art. He shook opera and all its associated theoretical and practical issues from a comfortable state of repose bordering on stagnation.”

Richard Wagner (1813-1883): Transformation Music from Parsifal

In the 13th century, St. Thomas Aquinas penned a Latin hymn in praise of the holy sacrament of the last supper in which bread and wine are mystically changed into the body and blood of Christ. Aquinas’ text begins, “Pange lingua, gloriosi” or “Sing, my tongue, the Savior’s Glory.” Aquinas’ words have been set to a melody much older than his text, possibly derived from a Roman marching song or an even earlier Hebrew chant.

On May 21, 1983, this ancient text and tune underwent yet another transformation at the hands of American composer and jazzman Dave Brubeck, when his Pange Lingua Variations for chorus, jazz ensemble and orchestra had its premiere at the Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament in Sacramento, California.

In Brubeck’s setting, each stanza is sung first in original Gregorian chant style, followed by a variation. He said, “I searched for the meaning of each stanza, and tried to convey that thought musically, so that each variation is a miniature meditation.” The third variation, taking its cue from the music’s possible origin as a Roman marching tune, is given an appropriately martial treatment by both the chorus and jazz ensemble.

While jazz fans associate Brubeck with the sophisticated jazz he developed in the 50s and 60s, church musicians also know him as the composer of many oratorios on sacred themes, which often incorporate jazz elements into their scoring.

Dave Brubeck (1920-2012): Pange Lingua Variations; Brubeck Quartet; London Voices; London Symphony; Russell Gloyd, conductor; Telarc 80621

It was the fashion in the late 19th century to decorate concert halls with the names of famous composers like Bach, Beethoven and Brahms. Of course, over time some composers once very popular fell out of favor, and many old concert hall walls included names like Cherubini and Meyerbeer, composers who nowadays are performed only on rare occasions.

In Amsterdam, the main hall of the acoustically famous Concertgebouw boats a pantheon of over two dozen composers’ names as part of its interior decoration, and, not surprisingly, a few Dutch composers are included in the mix. Most of the native sons so honored are probably unfamiliar outside of the Netherlands, however. Take for example Alfons Diepenbrock, a self-taught composer and conductor born in Amsterdam who lived from 1862 to 1921. Diepenbrock composed a small body of big orchestral works in the late Romantic style of Gustav Mahler, who was a close friend.

In Amsterdam on today’s date in 1906, the Concertgebouw Orchestra and conductor Willem Mengelberg premiered a work of Diepenbrock’s, In Great Silence — a Mood Poem based on an Aphorism of Friedrich Nietzsche. This music sounds a little like a lost movement from some big Mahler symphony, and while these days the name Diepenbrock might not be as familiar as Mahler, maybe that’s something we should work on correcting!

Alfons Diepenbrock (1862-1921): In Great Silence (A Mood Poem based on an Aphorism of Friedrich Nietzsche); Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra; Riccardo Chailly, conductor (live recording); Royal Concertgebouw Recordings 97033

Australian composer Jodie Blackshaw is passionate about music for wind band and is fond of quoting her famous compatriot composer Percy Grainger on the subject:

“Why this cold-shouldering of the wind band?” Grainger asked. “Is the wind band — with its varied assortments of reeds (so much richer that the reeds of the symphony orchestra), its complete saxophone family that is found nowhere else ... its army of brass — not the equal of any medium ever conceived? As a vehicle of deeply emotional expression it seems to me unrivalled.”

For her part, Blackshaw has chosen to compose primarily for wind band. She also appears as a guest clinician and adjudicator for band festivals throughout Australia. “The Wind Band offers a varied and colorful contribution to instrumental music, and with literally millions of children worldwide entering musical performance through this medium, it is worthy of our serious attention,” she said.

On today’s date in 2014, a new work by Blackshaw intended for middle-school band students was premiered by the Rosemount Middle School Band of Rosemont, Minnesota, under the direction of John Zschunke. The new piece, Letter from Sado, was inspired by a Japanese haiku and traditional Japanese taiko drumming. This work is part of the BandQuest series commissioned by the American Composers Forum, intended to offer young musicians a diverse variety of fresh new wind band works by leading composers of our day.

Jodie Blackshaw: Letter from Sado; University of Minnesota Wind Ensemble; Hal Leonard HL04004132 (sheet music)

Temple Emanu-El in San Francisco is one of America’s foremost reform congregations. For some 50 years its cantor was Reuben Rinder, who, in addition to his liturgical duties, was a composer, impresario, and musical mentor. Cantor Rinder influenced the careers of two of the 20th century’s greatest violinists, Yehudi Menuhin and Isaac Stern, and also commissioned two of the 20th century’s most famous concert versions of the Jewish liturgy, the Evening and Morning Sabbath Service settings of Ernst Bloch and Darius Milhaud.

Milhaud’s Sabbath Morning Service was first heard at Temple Emanu-El on today’s date in 1949, with its composer conducting.

Milhaud was born in Provence and wrote that the Provencal Jewish tradition evoked in his score differs somewhat from the more standard Ashkenazi liturgy prevalent in most American synagogues then and now. The composer’s intention was to create a personal musical statement that could serve as both an actual liturgy for the faithful and as an ecumenical musical experience for any and all who hear the work, whether in temple or concert hall.

In that respect, Milhaud’s Sacred Service was a great success. Alongside Bloch’s setting, written in the early 1930s, shortly before the onset of the Holocaust, Milhaud’s setting, written in the years following the conclusion of World War II, remains a powerful and moving affirmation of religious faith.

Darius Milhaud (1892-1974): Sabbath Morning Service; Prague Philharmonic Choir; Czech Philharmonic; Gerard Schwarz, conductor; Naxos 8.559409

While many great composers have also been great conductors, this can be the exception rather than the rule. On today’s date in 1959, American composer Ned Rorem tried his hand at conducting the premiere of one of his own compositions, the chamber suite Eleven Studies for Eleven Players.

Rorem recalled, “I learned that the first requisite to becoming a conductor is an inborn lust for absolute monarchy, and that I, alone among musicians, never got the bug. I was terrified. The first rehearsal was a model of how not to inspire confidence. I stood before the eleven players in all my virginal glory, and announced: ‘I’ve never conducted before, so if I give a wrong cue, do try to come in right anyway.’”

Fortunately for Rorem, his eleven musicians were accomplished faculty at Buffalo University, and, despite his inexperience, he certainly knew how his new piece should sound. His suite incorporated a few bits recycled from music he had written for a successful Broadway hit — Tennessee Williams’ Suddenly Last Summer — plus a bit from the unsuccessful play Motel that never made it past a Boston tryout.

Rorem’s own tryout as a conductor convinced him to stick to composing, although he proved to be a fine piano accompanist for singers performing his own songs. As for Eleven Studies for Eleven Players, it’s gone on to become one of his most-often performed chamber works.

Ned Rorem (1923-2022): Eleven Studies for Eleven Players; New York Chamber Ensemble; Stephen Rogers Radcliffe, conductor; Albany 175

On today’s date in 1868, Czech composer Bedrich Smetana helped lay the foundation stone for Prague’s future National Theatre. As the stone was driven into the soil with a ceremonial mallet, Smetana exclaimed, “In music is the life of the Czechs!” That same evening at Prague’s New Town Theatre, Smetana conducted the premiere performance of his new opera Dalibor. It’s worthy of note that one of the players in the orchestra was 26-year old violist and fellow composer Antonín Dvořák.

The subject matter of Dalibor seemed theatrically apt for the occasion: a Czech legend about a rebellious 15th century knight imprisoned for supporting a peasant uprising. During his imprisonment, according to the legend, Dalibor learned to play the violin so beautifully that people came to listen to him outside the window of the Prague Castle tower in which he was held.

Thirteen years after the premiere of Dalibor, the National Theatre opened on June 11, 1881. For that gala occasion, another Smetana opera, Libuse, received its premiere performance. Sadly, by that time Smetana was completely deaf, mentally ailing and desperately poor.

To add insult to injury, the directors of the new theater had neglected to invite him to the gala premiere of his own opera! Despite the inexcusable snub, Smetana found his way into the theater, and, when called on the stage and recognized by the audience, was acknowledged with thunderous applause.

Bedrich Smetana (1824-1884): Act I Prelude and opening chorus, from Dalibor; Prague National Theatre Orchestra and Chorus; Zdenek Kosler, conductor; Supraphon ‎SU0077-2 632

American composer Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate is a citizen of the Chickasaw Nation and its Composer-in-Residence. He was born in Norman, Oklahoma, and his chamber and orchestra works, all infused with themes and musical elements from his Native heritage, have been performed by major orchestras like the Detroit Symphony, the Minnesota Orchestra, the Colorado Ballet, and the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival.

But during the fall of 2011, Tate began working with a non-professional ensemble closer to home — at Dickson Middle School in Dickson, Oklahoma. Tate had been commissioned by the American Composers Forum to write a new work for their ChoralQuest series for middle-school choirs. The resulting work, Taloowa’ Chipota, which in the Chickasaw language means Children’s Songs, was premiered on May 15, 2012, by the children at the Dickson School.

“The songs, are reminiscent of traditional stomp dancing and are based on old Chickasaw melodies,” explained Tate. “Stomp dances begin at dusk and end at dawn. The first movement depicts the beginning sunlight of the morning. The second is full of abstracted textures emulating the shell shaking in stomp dances.”

For his part, Tate says he’s pleased how it all turned out: “I was able to introduce a Chickasaw experience to a diverse group of students … I strengthened my own relationship with my Chickasaw community and demonstrated to the Chickasaws in the chorus how our culture can positively impact classical music.”

Jerod Tate (b. 1968): Taloowa Chipota (Children’s Songs); Minnesota Boy Choir; Hal Leonard 00119300 (sheet music)

On today’s date in 1897, John Philip Sousa was in Philadelphia and leading his band in the premiere performance of The Stars and Stripes Forever! Sousa wrote his most famous march on Christmas Day, 1896, in a New York hotel room — completing the score, he said, in just a couple of hours. The work’s title was a tribute to one of Sousa’s mentors, legendary bandmaster Patrick S. Gilmore, whose favorite toast was, “Here’s to the Stars and Stripes forever!”

The 1897 premiere of the march went over well, but at first sales didn’t surpass the other Sousa marches available at the time. It was the outbreak of the Spanish-American War in 1898, the subsequent national eruption of patriotic fervor, and some cagey showmanship on Sousa’s part that catapulted The Stars and Stripes Forever! into its unique status. Sousa crafted a touring patriotic pageant involving hundreds of performers, which ended with The Stars and Stripes Forever! playing, as soldiers from all three branches of the military marched on stage with flags unfurled, culminating in the entrance of an attractive local beauty decked out in red, white and blue.

Despite the thousands of times Sousa and his band were required to play The Stars and Stripes Forever! they claimed they never tired of it. And in its now 100+ year history, it’s become one of the most frequently performed pieces of American music worldwide.

John Philip Sousa (1854-1932): The Stars and Stripes Forever; Royal Artillery Band; Keith Brion, conductor; Naxos 8.559093