Montage # 57 - No. 104

As of July 6, 2012, this montage will no longer be available on Pod-O-Matic. It can be heard or downloaded from the Internet Archive at the following address / A compter du 6 juillet 2012, ce montage ne sera plus disponible en baladodiffusion Pod-O-Matic. Il peut être téléchargé ou entendu au site Internet Archive à l'adresse suivante:

http://archive.org/details/No.104_553




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English Commentary – le commentaire français suit

Music and numbers are no strangers to each other – in a world of order in chaos, it is inevitable that art and science meet at some point.. We find numbers everywhere in music: three movements in a concerto, four movements in a symphony, the opus numbers, the catalog numbers (K, BWV, FWV, S, D, Sz, …). The numerical order of like-works (27 Mozart Piano Concertos, 104 Haydn symphonies, 48 preludes and fugues in two books of the Well-Tempered Clavier).

The examples are so numerous that just writing these few sentences I probably could come up with dozens of programs based on musical numerology!

As stated in What’s New for June and in my summary page for this month’s series, I have come up with eight new playlists that will illustrate my take on Music by the Numbers. As I often do in these series, I can’t claim full credit for this… In fact, today’s first montage (on the number 104) takes flight from a TalkClassical discussion thread from a few moinths ago, noting that there are many great works that have in common the number 104.  One of them, Haydn’s last symphony, I am saving for a post later this summer but there is no reason to save my favourite number 104 for later: the feature work this week is Dvorak’s cello concerto, in one of the many recordings by the late great cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, who in later years put the cello aside to concentrate more on conducting, most notably with the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington.

Also featured in Sibelius' Symphony no. 6, a trumpet concerto by Michael Haydn and a Scarlatti keyboard sonata.

I think you will love this music too!

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Commentaire français

Qhand on parle de chiffres (ou de nombres) et de musique, il n'y a pas de surprises: là où il y a de l'ordre, il y a de la numérologie: trois mouvements dans un concerto, quatre mouvements dans une symphonie, 27 concerti pour piano de Mozart, 104 symphonies de Haydn...

Je ne sais pas pourquopi "104" aujourd'hui - il y a ce fil que j'ai lu il y a qielques mois (en anglais), qui suggère des tas d'oeuvres qui ont en commun le nombre 104 - numéros d'opus ou de catalogue surtout. Je vous convie de visiter le fil et explorer les illustrations fournies par les contributeurs, dont la cantate BWV 104 de Bach.

Je vous propose deux oeuvres d'envergure cette semaine: le concerto pour violoncelle de Dvorak sous l'archet de Mstislav Rostropovich, et la sixième symphonie de Sibelius sour Sir Colin Davis. Je réserve ce même chef plus tard cet été pour un autre 104 - la symphonie de Haydn... A suivre!

En attendant Papa Haydn, vous pourrez écouter le 103 de son frérot, Michael Haydn.

Bonne écoute!