Zubin Mehta and Pinchas Zukerman with Bruch’s First Violin Concerto

About the Work

Le nozze di Figaro (“The Marriage of Figaro”) was the first of Mozart’s three operas with the librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte, followed by Don Giovanni and Così fan tutte. Its source was Beaumarchais’s comedy La folle journée, ou le Mariage de Figaro, in which a servant outwits his aristocratic master. The opera opened at the Burgtheater in Vienna in May 1786, with Mozart directing from the keyboard.

The story unfolds over a single “mad day” in the household of Count Almaviva, as his valet Figaro and the maid Susanna try to get married while the Count schemes to seduce Susanna himself. The overture sets the pace for all this intrigue. The overture is in D major and marked Presto, and it is entirely self-contained. Unlike the overtures to The Abduction from the Seraglio, Così fan tutte and The Magic Flute, it neither quotes melodies from the opera nor runs straight into the first scene. Instead it captures the mood of the whole comedy, quick, witty and a little breathless, before a note of the plot has been sung. It is also often played on its own as a concert piece. The result lasts about four minutes.

What to Listen For

The overture begins with a hushed, scurrying figure, so quiet and fast that it almost sounds like whispering behind a door. It is easy to miss if the hall is still settling, so listen closely from the very first bar. Then the full orchestra bursts in, with trumpets and timpani. Listen for how often Mozart repeats this pattern of whisper and outburst, and for the chattering woodwind phrases that answer the violins. There is no slow section and no pause for breath: the music drives straight through to a brilliant close, just as the opera’s plot never lets its characters rest.

About the Work

Max Bruch wrote many works, including symphonies, operas and choral pieces, but for most concertgoers his name means one piece: the Violin Concerto No. 1 in G minor. It is one of the most frequently performed violin concertos of all, and its fame became something of a burden to its composer. Late in life Bruch complained that violinists kept turning up to play it for him and begged them to try his other concertos instead.

The concerto had a difficult birth. Bruch completed a first version in 1866, and it was performed that April with Bruch conducting. He was not satisfied and turned for advice to the great violinist Joseph Joachim, who helped him reshape the solo part. The revised concerto was first performed by Joachim in Bremen in January 1868, and it was this version that quickly entered the repertoire. Joachim’s influence can be heard in the natural, idiomatic virtuosity of the solo writing, which is brilliant without ever sounding mechanical.

The concerto is unusual in shape. Bruch called the first movement a Vorspiel, a prelude, and it leads without a break into the slow movement, which is the emotional heart of the work.

What to Listen For

I. Vorspiel: Allegro moderato. A quiet woodwind phrase is answered by the solo violin in a short, free cadenza. This happens twice before the movement proper begins, with a strong main theme and a warmer, more lyrical second one. At the end the opening cadenzas return, more elaborate than before, and the orchestra leads straight into the slow movement.

II. Adagio. One long song for the violin, over an orchestral accompaniment that keeps moving underneath. This is the music most listeners remember: listen for how the melody keeps rising to new climaxes, each more intense than the last.

III. Finale: Allegro energico. After a quiet, expectant orchestral introduction, the violin enters with a vigorous dance theme played in double stops (two strings at once). A broad, singing second theme interrupts it several times, before the tempo quickens into a final Presto and the concerto ends in a blaze of virtuosity.

About the Work

In the early 1880s Antonín Dvořák was becoming internationally famous. Brahms had championed him, his Slavonic Dances had sold widely, and his Stabat Mater had been a triumph in London. In June 1884 the Philharmonic Society of London elected him an honorary member and asked him for a new symphony. Dvořák had recently heard and admired Brahms’s new Third Symphony, and he set out to write something on the same scale: a symphony, as he wrote to a friend, that “must be capable of stirring the world”.

The Seventh is the darkest of Dvořák’s nine symphonies. The folk-dance colour of his so-called “Slavonic period” gives way to music of dramatic tension, gloom and stubborn defiance. Various explanations have been offered. Dvořák noted in the score that the main theme came to him as he watched a festive train arrive in Prague from Pest, bringing visitors to a patriotic event at the National Theatre. Others point to the death of his mother. The Dvořák Society’s own account is cautious about all of these readings, and it is best to let the music speak.

Dvořák completed the score on 17 March 1885 and conducted the first performance at St James’s Hall in London on 22 April. It was received with great enthusiasm. His German publisher, Simrock, was less keen and haggled over the fee, but Dvořák held out and eventually got the price he asked.

What to Listen For

I. Allegro maestoso. The main theme emerges quietly over a low, sustained D, like the calm before a storm, then rises suddenly to a harsh, dissonant peak. The second theme is gentler, but the development is one of the most dramatic passages Dvořák wrote. Listen to the end of the movement: after a fierce climax, the music ebbs away in the same hushed mood in which it began.

II. Poco adagio. A calm opening melody, sometimes heard as a prayer, is troubled by darker episodes. After the premiere Dvořák tightened this movement and told his publisher that there was “not a single superfluous note” left in the work.

III. Scherzo: Vivace. A dance, but not a carefree one. The main theme is sharply rhythmic, with a contrasting counter-melody, and the key of D minor keeps casting a shadow. Towards the end of the main section the music gathers into a wild, dark whirl.

IV. Finale: Allegro. The main theme opens with a bold upward leap and has a heroic, driving character. The movement fights its way through contrasting episodes to a broad, resolute coda that brings the symphony to a confident close.