Journey Borealis at Pyramid Hill Sculpture Park

Maurice Ravel (1875-1937)

Performance Information: Daniel Meyer conducting The Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra, August 13, 2016 at School for Creative & Performing Arts Corbett Auditorium

Ma Mere l’Oye combines childlike simplicity with a rich, eclectic harmonic language, in which ancient church modes, parallel chords, “Oriental” pentatonic scales and “white-key” pandiatonicism all lend their magic to the fairy-tale atmosphere. The Belgian critic and composer Roland-Manuel, in his youth a student of Ravel, described the “fairy garden” movement as “the green paradise of childhood loves, where desires are not accompanied by remorse, where creatures are only loved for the beauty which they reflect and where [the] Holy Innocents play catch with their haloes.”

Antonio Vivaldi (1685–1750)

Performance Information: Eckart Preu conducting The Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra, August 11, 2018 at School for Creative & Performing Arts Corbett Auditorium.

Possibly the most hotly debated topic in all of music history is the expressive potential of music—how music can depict or refer to anything outside itself, whether emotional states, verbal descriptions, or visual images. One thing music can do quite effectively is to depict or refer to other sounds, natural or manmade, and in this set of four violin concertos (part of a set of 12 published together as his Op. 8) Vivaldi often called upon the orchestra to imitate sounds of nature. Perhaps the most striking passages in the “Four Seasons” are his evocations of storms; with strings alone—high, sparkling violin figuration and string tremolos—Vivaldi draws startling effects. He evokes birdsong too, specifying particular varieties, and even adds a barking dog (the gruff viola notes in the slow movement of “Spring”). As a Seattleite, my favorite bit of imitation occurs in the slow movement of “Winter,” where pizzicato notes represent the plop of raindrops.

Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)

Performance Information: Robert Patemostro conducting The Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra, June 5, 2011 at School for Creative & Performing Arts Corbett Auditorium

The Hungarian Dances were party pieces, which for years before he bothered to write them down for piano four-hands and send them to a publisher, Simrock. In the spring of 1869, he finally did with a second set coming out in 1880. Simrock made a fortune off of them while Brahms took a flat fee, though the composer also did arrange them for piano two hands and his friend Joachim for violin and piano.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791)

Performance Information: Mischa Santora conducting The Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra, June 2, 2013 at School for Creative & Performing Arts Corbett Auditorium.

Mozart began work on the opera in October 1785, and managed to finish the long work in time for the May 1, 1786 premiere, despite other commitments: in particular, two other operatic projects, the one-act backstage farce The Impresario and some additional numbers for a revival of his 1781 drama Idomeneo.