“My aim throughout the program is to draw lines that connect Rachmaninoff to popular composers who came before him, like Irving Berlin, to American Songbook stalwarts who came after, like Harold Arlen, and to pianist-composers who also came after, like Billy Strayhorn and Stephen Sondheim. I do that through the strategic juxtaposition of works and an approach that hopscotches through time.” (Conrad Tao)
This “strategic juxtaposition of works” is a personal, creative exploration designed by our pianist. At first glance, the choices may not represent obvious links. But wait–even for us–people who have not yet heard the program, there are two commonalities that occur to me. Seven of the pieces were originally songs, with specific information in their lyrics. You need not know the words to realize that breathing is paramount to their performance. All of the pieces by Strayhorn, Arlen, Schumann and Sondheim are songs, as is Daisies by Rachmaninoff. Breath for a singer is the primary way in which musical phrasing is communicated. Once the human voice is removed, the phrasing must remain intact. This seemingly obvious statement isn’t obvious, though. Pianists can often get away with murder in terms of phrasing because the instrument itself doesn’t require breath for sound production. We can soldier on through phrases and cadences without so much as a by-your-leave. Mind, it’s not a good idea and much is lost, because the information inherent in songs provides a rich source of musical structure.
The other apparent link has to do with the presence and prominence of melody. Rachmaninoff is known for his melodies. Of him Tao has said “in terms of what sets his melodic gift apart, I think there really is something about how Rachmaninoff travels through his chords…he uses all of these lush internal voices as he harmonizes the beautiful melodies, yielding some pretty surprising twists and turns. But because the music sounds so lush on a purely sonic level, we don’t necessarily hear it as surprising, we just hear it as gorgeous.” Tao says, “across this whole program I’ve chosen music that has a bittersweet emotional tone to it”.
Three of the compositions are originally piano solos (the Prelude and the two Etude-Tableaux). Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini is a work for piano and orchestra, and the last piece is a fully symphonic work, arranged for piano solo by Inon Barnatan. All of the pieces, except the Schumann and Sondheim, were written over a thirty year period between 1910-1940.
The Prelude in G Major, Op. 32 No. 5 was written in the summer of 1910 in Ivanovka, Rachmaninoff’s idyllic summer residence. He lived here every summer between 1890 and 1917. After the 1917 revolution, many of the estate’s buildings were destroyed, but the main buildings have been restored. Since 1982 the home has been a museum, the only one in the world dedicated to the composer. Some original pieces of furniture were preserved and brought to the museum by residents of the surrounding villages. (At this writing, Ivanovka is within a war torn area of Ukraine. Artifacts and memorabilia have secretly been moved temporarily to Switzerland.)
Take the A Train by Billy Strayhorn is a jazz standard that became the signature tune of the Duke Ellington orchestra from 1941 until Ellington’s death in 1974. Strayhorn said he was writing subway directions after a new line opened because people were getting confused about the best way to get to Harlem. “Duke’s son Mercer Ellington recalled that he found Take the A Train in a garbage can after Strayhorn discarded it because it sounded too much like a Fletcher Henderson arrangement” (Smithsonian, 2009).
Stephen Sondheim’s In Buddy’s Eyes is from Follies, a musical produced in 1971. All the main characters are over 50, with themes of lost loves and midlife crises. This song is about a woman looking back over her life, trying to convince a former lover (and apparently herself) that she really does love Buddy, her husband.
Improvisation on Variation 15 from Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini will be new for all of us. The original piece was composed in 1934 after Rachmaninoff had been exposed to jazz in America. Apparently Rachmaninoff mentioned that he had been thinking of Art Tatum when he wrote this particular variation. No matter what Tao plays in his improvisation, this 15th variation will sound nothing like what you will hear later in the 18th.
In an interview for DownBeat magazine in 1949, Strayhorn said “I wrote Lush Life … while I was clerking at the Pennfield drugstore on the corner of Washington and Penn in Pittsburgh. I was writing a song a day then, and I’ve forgotten many of them myself ….One night I remembered it and played it for Duke ….I called it Life is Lonely, but when anyone wanted me to play it they’d ask for ‘that thing about lush life’ “. The lyrics Strayhorn wrote as a teenager predicted the life he did eventually lead. “He did become a socialite, he did make it to France. And he did become an alcoholic” (NPR, 2007).
Variation 18 from Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini is a beloved piece you will recognize from many sources–it’s been used in numerous movies, even in a video game. Rachmaninoff knew it was an appealing variation and stated “this one is for my agent” (Michael Steinberg, 1998).
Somewhere Over the Rainbow (after Art Tatum) was written for the Wizard of Oz in 1939, first sung by Judy Garland. Famous the world over, it was used as an audio wakeup call to astronauts aboard the first space shuttle mission to the International Space Station in 1998. According to Gene Wilder‘s family, he died while listening to Somewhere Over the Rainbow sung by Ella Fitzgerald. And anyone who has flown to Hawaii on Hawaiian Airlines has heard Iz’s version! Art Tatum was a prodigiously talented pianist known for his stride left hand, rapid right hand runs, and wild key changes, all while being nearly completely blind. Art Tatum had a profound impact on Rachmaninoff who is quoted as saying to Horowitz: “If this man decided to play classical music, we’re all in trouble”.
“Auf einer Burg” is from a cycle of twelve songs called Liederkreis. Schumann wrote the cycle in 1840, his “Year of Song”, when he was finally able to marry Clara Wieck. This particular lied is motionless. The text is from the vantage point of a long dead knight. Up there at his look-out, the old knight has fallen asleep; Rain-storms pass overhead, and the wood stirs through the portcullis. Beard and hair matted together, ruff and breast turned to stone, for centuries he’s sat up there in his silent cell.
The set of nine Etudes-Tableaux, Op. 39, were the last piano pieces Rachmaninoff wrote in Russia. He had been immersed in the compositions of his friend, Alexander Scriabin, and was writing these for a memorial recital. Although Rachmaninoff was not given to describing what each “tableau” implied, he did say that this one in A minor was inspired “by the sea and seagulls”.
Daisies was one of six songs in a set published in 1916. It is a simple, happy song about daisies, which are referred to as “the joy of plenty”.
Strayhorn was the composer, arranger and songwriter for Duke Ellington’s orchestra for three decades. In 2018 Strayhorn’s family brought 17,000 items to the Library of Congress, including “music manuscripts, letters, photographs, scrapbooks and business contracts.” Day Dream is one example of how Strayhorn’s style and Ellington’s style overlapped so closely that scholars have difficulty deciding where one ended and the other began. “Billy Strayhorn was my right arm, my left arm, all the eyes in the back of my head,” Ellington wrote in his memoir.
This Etude-Tableau in C minor, Op. 33 No. 3 is one of a set written in 1911 at Ivanovka, the summer residence described above. These were intended to be inspired by visual scenes, but Rachmaninoff rarely gave away what the scene might be. He wanted the listener to provide whatever came to them, rather than following a specific image.
Symphonic Dances was composed in 1940 in New York for a full orchestra. At that same time, Rachmaninoff wrote a two piano version, which he played with Vladimir Horowitz. Now Inon Barnatan has arranged it for one spectacular piano offering. Of his transcription, he has said “People think of it as virtuosic because it’s so hard to play, but I think he [Rachmaninoff] primarily uses notes as colors, the way a painter can use thousands of different colors to convey one color. The virtuosity is never the goal. It’s almost a byproduct of the music. The feats of virtuosity that are required to make this work are completely incidental to the effect of trying to sound like an orchestra and not like a piano.”
© Diane Baxter, 2024
