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The highlight of Firebird’s next concert on 8 February will be Vivaldi’s masterwork Le quattro stagioni ‘The Four Seasons’. We discover the journey that led the 25-year-old Red Priest, or il Prete Rosso as he was nicknamed after his ordination in 1703, to write one of the most enduring works in the classical repertoire…
When Antonio Lucio Vivaldi was born in Venice in 1678 it was the capital of the Most Serene Republic of Venice. The day of his birth was also marked by a severe earthquake that shook the city so that his mother dedicated him to the priesthood. By the age of 24 he had developed prodigious musical skills and had started working at an orphanage called the Ospedale della Pietà as a maestro di violino (master of violin).
Antonio Vivaldi
The German architect Johann Friedrich von Uffenbach described Vivaldi’s playing as:
‘that famous composer and violinist … played a solo accompaniment excellently, and at the conclusion he added a free fantasy [an improvised cadenza] which absolutely astounded me, for it is hardly possible that anyone has ever played, or ever will play, in such a fashion.’
Vivaldi’s real breakthrough as a composer came with his first collection of 12 concerti L’estro armonico. Published in 1711 and dedicated to Grand Prince Ferdinand of Tuscany, they became a resounding success all over Europe and he was soon travelling and performing for the Governor of Mantua, in Milan, and then in Rome before returning to Venice in 1725.
It was during this period of travel that he wrote The Four Seasons, his collection of four violin concertos which were a revolution in musical conception in their day.
Il Cimento dell’armonico
Depicting flowing creeks, singing birds, buzzing mosquitoes, crying shepherds, drunken dancers, frozen landscapes and warming winter fires, these concerti stand as one of the earliest and most detailed examples of what would come to be called programme music.
Vivaldi relates his music to the texts of sonnets. Possibly written by himself, these are written directly into the manuscript giving specific descriptions to the musical narrative.
Since Vivaldi’s day The Four Seasons has been used in arrangements, transcriptions, covers, remixes, samples, and parodies in all manner of genres from film soundtracks to rhythmic gymnastics and synchronised swimming – all broadened the awareness and appeal of this amazing music far beyond the classical spectrum.
In 1970 the Argentina composer Ástor Piazzolla published Estaciones Porteñas – The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires. Inspired by Vivaldi’s masterpiece this work will also performed in the 8 February Firebird concert. More on that extraordinary work in the next newsletter…
Antonio Vivaldi
Le Quattro Stagioni (The Four Seasons)
Astor Piazzolla
Estaciones Porteñas (The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires)
Directed from the violin by Thomas Gould
Internationally seasoned violinist Thomas Gould performs Vivaldi’s dazzling ‘Four Seasons’ and Piazzolla’s ‘Four Seasons of Buenos Aires’.
Antonio Vivaldi may have been one of the first composers to have composed music inspired by the seasons, but many others have also created some amazing compositions from this starting point, as Nicholas Keyworth discovers…
It is probably only natural that so many composers have taken this cyclic theme as the starting point for compositions. Following his 1798 success with The Creation, Franz Joseph Haydn started work on The Seasons. This was his last great oratorio and is considered one of his masterworks. Its four parts correspond to Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter and features a rousing chorus with a hunting song with horn calls, a wine celebration with dancing peasants and a loud thunderstorm.
On one level Benjamin Britten’s 1949 Spring Symphony is a conventional 4 movement symphony. Yet this choral symphony has soprano, alto and tenor soloists, mixed chorus, boys’ choir and orchestra. Britten sets texts by 16th and 17th century poets plus one by his friend WH Auden Out on the lawn I lie in bed . The climax of the Finale, London, to Thee I do Present, sees a wordless and wine and ale fortified chorus representing the May revellers before the boys’ choir re-enters the scene singing the 13th century round Sumer is icumen in.
Bradford born but latterly Parisian based Frederick Delius approaches his seasonal settings as orchestral tone poems with On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring in 1912 and Summer Night on the River the following year. Pure ‘English Pastoral’, these evocative pieces depict cuckoo calls on oboe and clarinet and quote traditional folk songs in a romantic and descriptive way – although one of them is actually a Norwegian folk-song.
Pavlova Anna as a bacchante in The Seasons
Alexander Glazunov – the man they called the Russian Brahms – was director of the St. Petersburg Conservatory under the reign of Czar Nicholas II and become the first Free Artist of the Soviet Republic. His 1899 ballet The Seasons, is a somewhat Romantic work, occasionally descriptive, but with a certain underlying Classical temperament. It’s an allegorical ballet with its four scenes each depicting a season original choreographed by Marius Petipa.
In 1875, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky began writing a set of twelve character pieces for solo piano. In The Seasons each piece describes the characteristic nature of a different month of the year. Troika (November) was popularised by Rachmaninoff’s as his favourite encore while Barcarolle (June) was to appear in arrangements for orchestra, violin, cello, clarinet, harmonium, guitar and even mandolin.
For Tchaikovsky these were simply a way of supplementing his income. Descriptive subtitles and epithets were added by Nikolay Matveyevich Bernard, the editor of the St. Petersburg music magazine Nouvellist who commissioned the work.
So, for example December is entitled Christmas with some lines by Vasily Zhukovsky:
Once upon a Christmas night the girls were telling fortunes: taking their slippers off their feet and throwing them out of the gate.
Robert Schumann
Robert Schumann’s first symphony is also known as the Spring Symphony and was premiered in 1841 under the baton of Felix Mendelssohn. According to Clara’s diary, the title comes from Adolf Böttger’s poem Frühlingsgedicht – the opening being traditionally associated with the closing lines O wende, wende deinen Lauf/Im Thale blüht der Frühling auf! (O, turn, O turn and change your course/In the valley, Spring blooms forth!). However, Schumann himself said he was merely inspired by his Liebesfrühling (spring of love).
Astor Piazzolla
Estaciones Porteñas (The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires) are a set of four tango compositions written by Ástor Piazzolla between 1965 and 1970 – ‘porteño’ referring to someone born in Buenos Aires. Originally conceived as separate compositions for his quintet of violin, piano, electric guitar, double bass and bandoneón, Russian composer Leonid Desyatnikov made a new arrangement of the work making the link between Vivaldi and Piazzolla more obvious. He did this by converting each of pieces into three-section pieces, re-arranging for solo violin and string orchestra and including quotations from original Vivaldi’s work.
And that brings us to Antonio Vivaldi’s revolutionary Le quattro stagioni (The Four Seasons). These famous violin concertos from around 1721 depict flowing creeks, singing birds, buzzing mosquitoes, crying shepherds, drunken dancers, frozen landscapes and warming winter fires.
Vivaldi added descriptive sonnets evoking the spirit of each season. Specific lines are assigned directly to the relevant musical passage. So in the middle section of Spring we can see that as the goatherd sleeps, his barking dog are clearly marked in the viola section making The Four Seasons one of the very first examples of Programme music.
Since Vivaldi’s day The Four Seasons have been used in arrangements, transcriptions, covers, remixes, samples, and parodies in all manner of genres from film soundtracks to rhythmic gymnastics and synchronised swimming – all broadened the awareness and appeal of this amazing music far beyond the classical spectrum.
Hear two of these remarkable works in Firebird Well-Seasoned on Thursday 8 February.
The new Firebird season got off to a glittering start last month with La Vie Parisienne and a fabulous taste of what’s to come in the concerts ahead.
After a mesmerising opening with Claude Debussy’s wistful Prélude à l’après midi d’un faune with Firebird’s orchestral soloists Michael Liu on flute and James Hulme on oboe, award-winning Chinese soprano He Wu began her two operatic arias with Me voilà seule dans la nuit from George Bizet’s 1863 opera The Pearl Fishers. Leïla, a priestess of Brahma quietly muses on the times when she and Nadir, a fisherman, would meet together secretly.
Artistic Director, Marc Corbett-Weaver was thrilled at the reception to the season’s
opening concert:
“We had a packed out audience at St Paul’s Covent Garden on 10 October to watch this fabulous orchestra’s French-themed concert. It was a huge thrill to welcome back Aleksei Kiseliov as soloist in Saint-Saens’ Cello Concerto no. 1 and the stunning Chinese Soprano He Wu who dazzled us with a pair of operatic arias.”
He Wu continued with Les oiseaux dans la charmille (The Doll Song: ‘The birds in the arbor’) from Jaques Offenbach’s 1881 opéra fantastique, The Tales of Hoffmann. In this hilarious scene Hoffmann falls in love with Olympia without realising she is an automaton created by a scientist. As Olympia sings she periodically runs down and needs to be wound up before she can continue.
Reviewer David Nice wrote of He Wu:
“Her comedy was spot-on in Offenbach’s Doll Song – rhythmically timed eyelash-flutters included”
The stunning Cello Concerto No 1 by Camille Saint-Saëns was performed by Belarusian cellist Aleksei Kiseliov. Composed in 1872 and premiered at the Paris conservatoire, many composers, including Shostakovich and Rachmaninoff, considered this concerto to be the greatest of all cello concertos.
Belarusian cellist Aleksei Kiseliov
Nice was also very enthusiastic about this performance writing:
“There was certainly another remarkable partnership on display with Belarusian cellist Aleksei Kiseliov in Saint-Saëns’ First Cello Concerto”
And coming up in 2018 three more concerts as part of our season. Don’t miss our next one on Thursday 8 February with a concert of Vivaldi and Piazzolla directed from the violin by Thomas Gould.
Thursday 8 February 2018 sees the next concert from the London Firebird Orchestra with Firebird Well Seasoned. This lively programme of music by Vivaldi & Piazzolla will be directed from the violin by Thomas Gould.
The internationally seasoned violinist Thomas Gould, pictured above, returns to Firebird directing this concert from the violin. One of our leading genre-crossing British violinists, Gould is equally at home playing classical music in the concert hall, jazz at Ronnie Scotts or recording with Radiohead.
‘Gould plays with a pure, shining, even spiritual lyricism’
– Financial Times
Antonio Vivaldi
Antonio Vivaldi, also known as il Prete Rosso (the Red Priest), wrote his hugely popular set of four violin concertos, The Four Seasons in 1721 for the girls of the Ospedale della Pietà in Venice.
These wonderful baroque concertos evoke the spirit of each season through highly descriptive musical imagery ranging from slippery ice to barking dogs.
Astor Piazzolla
The Argentinian composer Astor Piazzolla revolutionised the traditional tango into the new style termed Nuevo Tango incorporating elements from jazz and classical music.
His Four Seasons of Buenos Aires paints an evocative portrait of the Argentinian city of Buenos Aires as it passes through the four seasons in the year.
St George’s Hanover Square
This exciting concert takes place in the beautiful setting of St George’s Hanover Square, one of London’s most popular music venues.
One of 12 beautiful new churches created after Queen Anne’s 1711 Act to meet the needs of those who had moved out of the cramped old City of London, St George’s was a particular favourite of the composer Handel, who lived just around the corner!
London Firebird Orchestra 2017/18 Season
FIREBIRD WELL SEASONED
St George’s, Hanover Square, London
Thursday 8 February 2018
, 7.30pm
Tickets £35, £25, £15
PROGRAMME
Antonio Vivaldi
– Le Quattro Stagioni
(The Four Seasons)
Astor Piazzolla
- Estaciones Porteñas
(The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires)
Following Wednesday’s hugely successful launch event we now look forward to the first concert of the Firebird 2017/18 season on 10 October with La Vie Parisienne in the exquisite setting of St Paul’s Covent Garden.
Known affectionately as The Actors’ Church, St Paul’s, Covent Garden has long been associated with the theatre world since the opening of the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in 1663 – the first of many of London’s West End theatres.
Many well known musicians, artists and actors have memorials in the church including Thomas Arne, Sir Charles Mackerras, Dame Edith Evans, Sir Charlie Chaplin, Sir Noël Coward, Gracie Fields, Stanley Holloway, Boris Karloff, Vivien Leigh and Ivor Novello.
This classical gem by Inigo Jones is one of England’s first buildings in the new Palladian style built in 1633. It is the perfect setting for this wonderful concert of world famous orchestral music including a concerto and operatic arias by Debussy, Offenbach, Bizet, Saint-Saëns and Beethoven.
And working with the excellent forces of London Firebird Orchestra we welcome three very special performers with the return of conductor Jonathan Bloxham – now Assistant Conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra; renowned Belarusian cellist and Principal Cello of the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Aleksei Kiseliov; and the award-winning Chinese soprano He Wu who was selected to sing before the First Lady of China, Madam Peng, on her visit to the UK in 2015.
Jonathan Bloxham, Aleksei Kiseliov and He Wu
Tickets are now on sale for this magnificent opening concert to our 2017-18 series in this wonderful and historic venue. Be sure to get your tickets in advance for what promises to be another hugely popular event by London Firebird Orchestra.
Our next Firebird concert, La Vie Parisienne, features wonderful music by four French composers: Debussy, Offenbach, Bizet and Saint-Saëns. In this feature we take an overview of the classical music of France…
By the 17th century, Italian opera became the vogue but in France the composer Lully developed a French national opera style – and they loved dance and the ballet which was to be an integral aspect of many musical forms.
Pearl Fishers
Studying in Italy, Georges Bizet was undeniably influenced by the legacy of its music and culture yet his opera, The Pearl Fishers, rises ‘far above the level of contemporary French opera’ with music which is atmospheric and deeply evocative of the opera’s Eastern setting.
Offenbach
Towards the end of the 19th century grew the lighter and often more frivolous Operatta with composers such as Jaques Offenbach being one of the leading lights often boasting that he had composed over 100 operas including Orpheus in the Underworld, La belle Hélène and La Vie Parisienne.
At the turn of the 20th century composers such as Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel developed a new style of composition known as Impressionism. This new found freedom enabled them to create amazing mood pictures with an emphasis on tone colours – as we see in Debussy’s Prélude à l’après midi d’un faune.
Monet’s Bridge over Waterlilies
The most distinguished French composer of his generation must be Camille Saint-Saëns whose incredibly prolific output included five symphonies, five piano concertos, three violin concertos, two cello concertos and some 20 concertante works for soloists and orchestra.
However, he was not with controversy and there was a particular animosity with Claude Debussy who once stated, ‘I have a horror of sentimentality and cannot forget that its name is Saint-Saëns.’
Samson and Delilah
Saint-Saëns’ flamboyant opera Samson and Delilah also ran into trouble when London’s Lord Chamberlain slapped a censorship ban on the whole opera. The ban lasted until 1909, some 30 years after its premiere in Paris.
Find out more about the distinctively French themes in the music of London Firebird Orchestra’s opening season concert, La Vie Parisienne on 10 October.
The concert opens with Claude Debussy’s wistful Prélude à l’après midi d’un faune. Inspired by Stéphane Mallarmé’s poem, this is one of Debussy’s most famous works, considered to be a turning point in the history of music. However, Mallarmé was displeased to hear his poem had been used as the basis for music. Nevertheless, when he attended the premiere performance in 1894 he was so transfixed by the music he subsequently wrote to Debussy declaring it ‘a marvel’.
Prélude à l’après midi d’un faune
A pair of French nineteenth century operatic arias follows sung by the award-winning Chinese soprano He Wu. Firstly we have Les oiseaux dans la charmille (The Doll Song: ‘The birds in the arbor’) from Jaques Offenbach’s 1881 opéra fantastique, The Tales of Hoffmann. In this scene Hoffmann falls in love with Olympia, an automaton created by a scientist. As Olympia sings she periodically runs down and needs to be wound up before she can continue.
Me voilà seule dans la nuit
The second operatic extract is from George Bizet’s 1863 opera The Pearl Fishers. Leïla, a priestess of Brahma sings Me voilà seule dans la nuit in which she quietly muses on the times when she and Nadir, a fisherman, would meet together secretly. Despite a good reception by the public, press reactions to the opera were generally hostile and dismissive. Yet today, Bizet’s opera is part of the core repertoire of many opera houses worldwide.
Saint-Saens
The stunning Cello Concerto No 1 by Camille Saint-Saëns will be performed by another star of the show: Belarusian cellist Aleksei Kiseliov. Composed in 1872 and premiered at the Paris conservatoire, many composers, including Shostakovich and Rachmaninoff, considered this concerto to be the greatest of all cello concertos.
Napoleon
The final work in the programme is not French at all but has French connections. When Ludwig van Beethoven’s Symphony no. 7 was premiered in 1813 with Beethoven himself conducting it was for a charity concert for soldiers wounded in the Battle of Hanau. It was so well received that the audience demanded the Allegretto movement be encored immediately. The program also included the patriotic work Wellington’s Victory, exalting the British victory over Napoleon.
London Firebird Orchestra 2017/18 Season:
Opening Concert
LA VIE PARISIENNE
St Paul’s Covent Garden ’The Actors Church’, London
Tuesday 10 October 2017
, 7.30pm
Tickets £35, £25, £15
We are absolutely thrilled with the news that our very own Tom Blomfield has been appointed joint principal at The Philharmonia Orchestra where he will share the position of Principal Oboe with Gordon Hunt.
In addition to playing with London Firebird Orchestra, Tom has played as principal oboe in a number of projects with the Royal Academy of Music Symphony Orchestra with Edward Gardner, Oliver Knussen and Sir Mark Elder. In his second year at the RAM, Tom was selected to play principal oboe in the Royal Academy of Music Soloists Ensemble with Trevor Pinnock, in a project that culminated in a release on Linn Records of Mozart’s Serenade for 13 Winds in B Flat.
Originally from North Wales, in 2012 Tom became the Gregynog Young Musician and Chester Young musician, gaving solo recitals at the Machynlleth and Tenby music festivals and at the Wesley Chapel in Chester. In the same year, he appeared as soloist in the Vaughan Williams and Boughton oboe concertos.
Tom has appeared as guest principal oboe with the London Symphony Orchestra and BBC Symphony Orchestra, and has performed with Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and Sinfonia Cymru. At the age of 22, Tom joins the Philharmonia in September 2017.
“We are delighted that Tom is joining the Philharmonia Orchestra. The members were hugely impressed with Tom’s performances with the Orchestra, and we look forward to welcoming him.”
– Kira Doherty, Chair of the Philharmonia Orchestra
Tom has also been involved in various Firebird outreach projects including the wind quintet workshop project performing and recording student compositions at Middlesex University in 2016
Make sure you have the dates in your diary for the London Firebird Orchestra’s 2017-18 concert series.
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Without the loyal following of our audience members none of what we do would be possible. The Firebird Friends & Benefactors Society is at the heart of our organisation. This association of around 100 supporters provides the bedrock of funding for our orchestra.
Join us on our journey to secure our future by becoming a Firebird Friend from as little as £50 a year…
We are currently planning an exciting season for 2016-17 which we know you will enjoy. But each concert costs several thousands of pounds to produce. Even with good ticket sales from our more popular concerts, Firebird’s concert income falls short of its expenditure.
The need for subsidy is a reality encountered by almost all projects in the performing arts world. Now even more than before it is vital that we can generate financial support from our Friends will enables the orchestra’s work to continue to prosper.
Membership of the Friends & Benefactors Society focuses upon charitable giving. However, the orchestra is very keen to acknowledge support and to offer what it can in return. Members are invited to an annual reception at the start of each concert season every autumn, at which there is a chance to meet the orchestra’s players and conductors. Supporters also enjoy priority booking and other privileges at the concerts themselves, as well as recognition in concert programmes and on the website.
“Firebird Orchestra combines a high level of musical competence with the exuberance of youth. They are a delight to watch perform and we are proud to support these young musicians as they set out to establish their careers.”
Michael & Helen Brown
Chair Benefactors of Firebird Orchestra
(Sponsoring the 1st Violin Chair)
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