As of January 10, 2014, 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 10 janvier 2014, 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:
https://archive.org/details/Pcast135
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English Commentary –
le commentaire français suit
Our second
and final look at Tchaikovsky’s concertos features his second and
third piano concertos as Tchaikovsky saw them.
Seems that
all three of Tchaikovsky’s concertos have their own “soap opera” story behind them.
For example, according to Modest Tchaikovsky, it was his brother's original
intention to dedicate the First concerto to the "colossal virtuoso
force" of Nikolay Rubinstein, but the composer's feelings were wounded so
deeply [by Rubinstein's criticism of the work, as we discussed last week’s
post] that Tchaikovsky subsequently changed his mind… In 1880 Tchaikovsky
decided to dedicate his Second Piano Concerto to Rubinstein, for his
"magnificent" playing of the First Concerto. Rubinstein was to have
premiered the concerto in Moscow, but died shortly before the scheduled
performance.
The second
concerto was born during a self-imposed “break” in the Fall of 1879. Tchaikovsky writes to his friend and benefactor Nadezhda von Meck about “a new
musical idea [starting] to take shape in my head". Soon after this, firmly
convinced that he was "absolutely incapable of going for long without
working", Tchaikovsky took up his new composition. "Today I started
to do something, and the boredom just flew away", writing at the end of
October that "I have begun to write a concerto for piano. The work will
not be rushed, and there is not the least chance that I should strain or tire
myself out".
Tchaikovsky
finds the time within his busy schedule to complete and orchestrate the work,
which he considered to be among his best, and one with which he had worked with
pleasure. However, the work was did not achieve the popularity of his First. Tchaikovsky
later writes "[The Second Concerto].contains many blunders of mine, but
the number of mistakes in the parts is, in a word, disgraceful. I have endured
many torments with this concerto at rehearsals".
When in
1888, Tchaikovsky's publisher wanted to reprint the concerto, Aleksandr Ziloti proposed to
Tchaikovsky a number of fundamental changes to the first and second movements.
Tchaikovsky did not agree with these, and decided only to make changes to the
piano part: "[My] author's sensibilities strongly riled by
your displacements and changes, and it is impossible for me to agree to them. I
want the Second Concerto in the form I had [touring partner, Wassily]
Sapelnikov play it, and I have marked your copy accordingly... " In his letter of reply, Ziloti wrote: "Of course I will [edit] the Second Concerto in the way you indicated, with the big violin solo in the
second movement completely cut!"
Today’s
montage proposes the Second Concerto as it was originally conceived and
published, including a very intricate slow movement in “triple concerto”
form that would make Beethoven proud!
It was not
until 1893 that Ziloti began to prepare the concerto in a revised edition, with
Tchaikovsky’s somewhat reluctantly agreeing to many of his changes, while being careful to preserve its overall form and
protect his original concept. Here is the
same concerto, under the Ziloti revision (as it is most commonly performed),
featuring Emil Gilels:
In a past
post, I discussed an unfinished – and apparently unsatisfactory – Tchaikovsky project for a Symphony in in E-flat major. Never taking the project past the
form of sketches, Tchaikovsky subsequently used them in the Piano Concerto No.
3, and also for the piano piece Scherzo-Fantaisie (No. 10 of the Eighteen
Pieces, Op. 72).
According
to dates in the manuscripts he began working on the first movement in June and
July of 1893, and completed it on 13 July. The other two movements were completed
in outline on 10-22 July 1893.
Tchaikovsky
told Aleksandr Ziloti that the concerto "hasn't turned out too badly as
music—but it's a thankless task! If that should be [fellow composer and pianist
Sergey] Taneyev's opinion then, perhaps, I shall destroy it forthwith".
In
October, Tchaikovsky showed the concerto to Taneyev, but despite the
latter's harsh criticism that the concerto was not sufficiently virtuosic, all
the same he did not destroy it. However, he had already begun to have doubts
about length of the work, writing "Since it has turned out to be disgracefully long, I have decided to
restrict it to just the first movement, and to call it Allegro de concert
or Conzertstück".
A few days
later Tchaikovsky began to orchestrate the opening Allegro brillante,
the completed score of which concludes with the date 3 October and the
note "End of 1st movement", suggesting that Tchaikovsky may have
changed his mind once again about the extent of the work. We may never know the
composer's final intentions, since immediately after completing the first
movement, he left directly for Moscow, and then for Saint Petersburg, where he
died on 25 October.
In late
June/early July 1894, Taneyev, at Modest Tchaikovsky's request, began to review
the manuscripts that Tchaikovsky had left behind. In September the same year the completed Allegro
brillante was published as a concerto one movement - our montage presents the concerto in
that form.
The latter two movements from Tchaikovsky’s sketchbook were
subsequently completed by Taneyev and published as a separate work — the
Andante and Finale, Op. 79. Embedded in the below French commentary, I included a performance of the Third concerto as a
three-movement work combining the Allegro brillante with the Andante and
finale:
To complete
the podcast, I included a performance of the Variations on a Rococo Theme
in A major, Tchaikovsky's first composition for cello and orchestra, written
between December 1876 and January 1877. For many years the Variations were
known only in a version heavily edited by Wilhelm Fitzenhagen, to whom the work
was dedicated.
An examination of the manuscript sources of
the Variations suggests that after completing the sketches, Tchaikovsky first
made an arrangement for cello and piano, which he gave for checking to
Fitzenhagen. The cellist made some changes, mainly to the cello part, inserting
them on Tchaikovsky's manuscript, and pasting over parts of the original
autograph. The full score is written wholly in the composer's hand, except for
a large section of the cello part (from bar six of the first variation up to
the end of the fourth, and from bar seven of the fifth variation up to the end
of the work), which was written by Fitzenhagen. It would therefore appear that
Tchaikovsky orchestrated the work from the piano arrangement as amended by
Fitzenhagen.
For a performance of the variations at the Wiesbaden Festival a year and a half later, Fitzenhagen made further changes to the piece, going so far as to change the order of the variations and cutting one out entirely! This move embittered the composer to teh point that when the time came to publish it, he was known to have said "To Hell with it! I shall leave it as is", referring to publishing the modified Fitzenhagen version... Tchaikovsky's original version was reconstructed and published for the first time in the 1950s, yjough the Fitzenhagen order of the variations is still viewed as the standard by soloists.
The
performance on the montage is from a recording by Canadian cellist Denis Brott,
with ethe NAC Orchestra under Mario Bernardi.
I think you will love this music too!
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Commentaire français
Notre billet d’aujourd’hui complète notre courte série sur
l’œuvre concertante de Tchaïkovski, proposant trois œuvres dont la genèse
pourraient faire les frais de romans fleuve… Voici quelques-uns des personnages
de ces romans : les pianistes et compositeurs Alexandre Ilitch
Ziloti, et Sergueï Ivanovitch Taneïev ainsi que le violoncelliste Wilhelm Karl
Friedrich Fitzenhagen.
Fitzenhagen est le dédicataire des Variations sur un thème
rococo, et en donna la première représentation le 30 Novembre 1877. Après avoir
produit une réduction pour violoncelle et piano pour la revue du soliste, ce
dernier fait plusieurs suggestions sur la partie solo, que Tchaïkovski adoptera
sans réserve. Plus tard, loin de se contenter de quelques corrections dans
l’intonation de l’instrument, Fitzenhagen choisit en outre de modifier la
séquence des variations, peut-être pour mieux mettre en évidence l’aspect
virtuose. Une variation en ré mineur (originalement la troisième) devient la
septième et une huitième varition est purement et simplement supprimée.
Fitzenhagen propose « sa version » au public du Festival de Wiesbaden
en Juin 1879, et écrira au compositeur:
J'ai produit un tollé avec vos variations . J'ai été
rappelé trois fois , et après l’Andante ( la variation en ré mineur ) on
me sert une tempête d'applaudissements. [Le Compositeur Franz ]
Liszt m'a dit: « Vous m'avez emporté Vous avez joué magnifiquement! »' et
au sujet de votre pièce il a observé : « là, au moins , c’est de la
vraie musique . »
Tchaïkovski n’était pas impressionné par la licence poétique
de son collègue violoncelliste. Quand le violoncelliste Anatoliy Brandoukov
discute des variations avec lui peu avant la publication finale en 1889 , il a
trouvé le compositeur " très en colère" « Cet idiot
Fitzenhagen était ici [en pointant la partition] Regardez ce qu'il a fait à mon
œuvre! […] Que le diäble l’emporte! Je la laisserai telle qu’elle. »
La séquience des vartaions proposée par Fitzenhagen sera
donc retenue et l’œuvre est maintenant un grand standard pour violoncelle et
orchestre. Encore aujourd’hui, même si la version originale du compositeur et
sa séquence ont refait surface, les variations sont encore jouées suivant la
séquence de Fitzenhagen.
Compte tenu du succès phénoménal de son premier concerto
pour piano, ses deuxième et troisièeme concerti sont moins bien
connus du public. Ces deux concerti ont également leurs histoires bien
particulières.
Exténué suite à une séquence de travail qui culmine avec son
opéra La pucelle d’Orléans, Tchaïkovski se propose de prendre un repos bien
mérité en septembre 1879. C’est durant ces quelques semaines de pause que
Tchaïkovski explore l’idée d’une nouvelle œuvre pour piano et orchestre – et
elle deviendra son deuxième concerto six mois plus tard. En termes de forme et
de cohésion, ce concerto est supérieur à son premier, et Tchaïkovski
l’affectionne particulièrement puisque créé dans un environnement de paix
interne.
La réaction du public n’atteint pas l’attente du
compositeur, et lorsqu’en tournée avec le concerto, il découvre que l’œuvre a
sa part de problèmes: "[Le deuxième Concerto].contient plein de bévues,
mais le nombre d’erreurs dans les parties [orchestrales] sont une disgrâce.
J’ai connu bien des tourments en répétition". – et de longueurs des dires
de son collègue Alexander Ziloti. Celui-ci propose une série de coupures qui
blessent l’âme créatrice du compositeur. Une quinzaine d’années plus tard,
lorsqu’approché par son éditeur pour une version revisée, et sous la pression
intense de Ziloti, Tchaïkovski accepte l’essentiel de ses suggestions de
coupures, faisant un effort de résistance si l’essence de l’œuvre était en jeu.
Le montage propose la version originale du concerto, alors
que le clip YouTube inclus dans la version anglaise du billet propose la
version modifiée.
Dans
un billet de mon festival Tchaïkovski de 2011, je
discute du projet inachevé (en fait, abandonné) d’une septième symphonie. Si le
projet de symphonie ne s’est pas matérialisé, les esquisses du projet furent
recyclées pour créer, entre autres, le premier mouvement d’un troisième
concerto pour piano.
Tchaïkovski présente ses esquisses à son collègue Serguei
Taneyev, qui reste plutôt froid tant qu’a l’aspect virtuosité pianistique du
concerto, mais encourage le compositeur à continuer de le travailler. Dans son
cahier, il développe un concerto en trois mouvements, mais le triouve trop
long, suggérant à ses proches que peut-être il se contentera de créer une pièce
pour piano et orchestre , un Allegro de concert ou Conzertstück.
La pièce, un Allegro brillante, emprunte ce qu’aurait
été le premier mouvement de la symphomie abandonnée, et il complétera son
orchestration (allant aussi loin sur le manuscrit que d’écrire « fin du
premier mouvement »). Est-ce que Tchaïkovski aurait repensé l’idée d’un
Conzertstuck? Son décès prématuré nous laissera sans réponse sur ce sujet.
Modeste Tchaïkovski demandera à Taneyev de reviser le
manuscrit de son frère avant de le publier comme « concerto no. 3 en un
seul mouvement ». Plus tard, Taneyev achèvera le travail de Tchaïkovski
sur l’andante et le finale (qu’il publiera posthumément comme l’op. 79 du
composteur), et il est permis de reconstruire ce qu’aurait été le troisième
concerto suivant la forme habituelle en trois mouvements.
Le voici joué par Irina Dubkova avec l;orchestre de Smolensk sous Vladimir Minin
Le montage, touitefois, propose le concerto en un mouvement, suivant les indications (présumément informées par le compositeur) de son frère Modeste.
Bonne écoute!
