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Publication Date

1-20-2008

Year of Release

2008

Note(s)

Michael Stroeher, trombone

Mila Markun, piano

Program Notes

While at the New England Conservatory I was fortunate to study trombone with John Swallow, a distinguished performer and teacher, who was also arguably one of the most intelligent people ever to make a living with the trombone. He was constantly challenging us to go beyond playing merely "correctly," but to make a piece of music interesting both to the performer and the listener, for example by bringing out hidden or unusual rhythmic and melodic patterns. One of his most effective methods of creating musical interest was through verbal and visual imagery; by making up stories or words or conjuring up pictures to go with what might otherwise be a dry, technical exercise or composition. This afternoon's performance comprises pieces that either have a story built in, otherwise known as "program music," or pieces which have sparked the imagination.

José Berghmans wrote La Femme a Barbe (The Bearded Lady) as one movement of a suite of solos for winds accompanied by string orchestra entitled "Scenes from a Traveling Circus. Other movements depict the horn as a wrestler, the clarinet as a tightrope walker, and the bassoon as a trained bear. The Bearded Lady begins with an especially poignant depiction of the performer alone in her wagon, forlorn because no one will have anything to do with her. As the circus music calls her onstage there is a graphic depiction in the piano of her tripping, falling, recovering, and finally, with the entrance of the trombone, performing her dance. At the conclusion of the dance she returns, alone, to her solitude.

Few composers have greater reputation than Paul Hindemith as a dry, academic contrapuntalist, and few of his compositions are less immediately accessible than his trombone sonata. Other than his designation of the third movement as "Swashbuckler's Song," there is no hint of any programmatic intent. This third movement, however was the catalyst for some of John Swallow's most memorable (and unprintable) lyrics. Trombone virtuoso Christian Lindberg characterized the first movement as Hindemith's depiction of Nazi tanks rolling across Europe, and the Swashbuckler as Hitler himself (not an unreasonable interpretation, considering the fact that Hindemith fled Nazi Germany in 1938 and emigrated to the United States in 1940).

If one considers all four of the movements together, the entire Sonata can be looked upon as a journey and return home. The fourth movement is a structural mirror of the first, with the second theme of the first movement becoming the first theme of the last, and vice versa. This concept of a journey outward and return home is a basic underlying archetype of musical structure, especially in tonal music.

The journey image calls forth the literary example of the Odyssey, in which Ulysses and his men set sail on a stormy sea (first movement), are tempted by the sirens to a life of sensuality (second movement), encounter pirates (Swashbucklers), and finally return home (fourth movement).

Frigyes Hidas's Movement evokes another myth. The piece is structured in five episodes, each of which climbs higher, moves faster and increases in volume before releasing slower, lower and softer. The myth of Sisyphus tells of a man who, because he greatly displeased the gods is condemned to roll a boulder up a hill, which then falls before he can reach the top. Sisyphus must repeat this task for eternity. Hidas at the end of his movement portrays a similar resignation and acceptance of his fate.

The Elegia in memoriam Duke Ellington is the second movement of Jan Koetsier's Concertino for trombone and string orchestra. The movement is a meditation on one of Ellington's most popular compositions, "Mood Indigo," and captures Ellington's bluesy atmosphere.

Juraj Filas, a native of Slovakia, studied at the Prague Conservatory, where he now teaches composition. His compositional language first stemmed from the serialist techniques of the early Twentieth Century; he later abandoned these techniques and has created a personal musical language, citing as musical influences the great European musical traditions and composers Giuseppe Verdi and Gustav Mahler, as well as contemporary events, religion and mysticism.

Filas's mystical influences are quite evident in the Preludium and the interludes in his Sonata "At the end of the century." It is also characterized by an intense rhythmic drive and complex syncopations.

There is definitely a story in there.

Note

Smith Recital Hall

Disciplines

Arts and Humanities | Fine Arts | Music | Music Performance

Marshall University Music Department Presents Tell Me A Story, Michael Stroeher, trombone, Mila Markun, piano

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