35th Bard Music Festival
Martinů and His World
"Part boot camp for the brain, part spa for the spirit" —The New York Times
The Bard Music Festival returns with an intensive two-week exploration of Martinů and His World. In eleven themed concerts featuring its boldest and most adventurous programming to date, the festival’s 35th season examines the life and times of Bohuslav Martinů (1890–1959), one of the most fascinating and prolific composers of the 20th century, whose music is nonetheless largely unfamiliar to U.S. audiences today.
Schedule Of Events:
11:00 am - Program Four - Martinů’s Distinctive Voice
In this thoughtfully curated concert with commentary, scholars-in-residence Michael Beckerman and Aleš Březina present chamber works by Martinů and his gifted composition student Vítězslava Kaprálová, with whom he was in love.
Folk idioms permeate Kaprálová’s accomplished First String Quartet, as they do so much of Martinů’s music, from the six instrumental miniatures of Les Rondes, which include some of his earliest uses of Moravian folk song, to the Variations on a Slovak Theme for cello and piano, written just months before he died. Yet Martinů’s characteristic sound reflects a wide and eclectic range of influences. The composer reveals a Stravinskyan approach to rhythm and dissonance in Les Rondes; draws on his love of Renaissance madrigals in the heartfelt slow movement of his Seventh String Quartet, “Concerto da camera”; and experiments with pentatonic harmonies in The Fifth Day of the Fifth Moon, written for Lee Hsien-Ming, the first female pianist to graduate from the Shanghai Conservatory, and the wife of his friend Alexander Tcherepnin.
Program
11 am - Performance with commentary by Michael Beckerman and Aleš Březina: with Danny Driver, piano; Balourdet Quartet; and others
Bohuslav Martinů (1890–1959)
String Quartet No. 7, “Concerto da camera,” H314 (1947)
The Fifth Day of the Fifth Moon, for piano, H318 (1948)
Les Rondes, H200 (1930)
Vítězslava Kaprálová (1915–40)
String Quartet No. 1, Op. 8 (1935)
Bohuslav Martinů
Variations on a Slovak Theme, H378 (1959)
Location: Olin Hall
3:00 pm - Program Five - From Paris to New York
Like Martinů, both Arthur Honegger and Aaron Copland achieved prominence in Paris between the wars, and all three subsequently taught under Serge Koussevitzky’s auspices at Tanglewood. This program juxtaposes Honegger’s sparkling Concerto da camera and Copland’s introspective Sextet with four of Martinů’s own compositions: the witty ballet La revue de cuisine, which casts its dancers as kitchen utensils and uses the Charleston, tango, foxtrot, and Dixieland jazz to satirical effect; the dazzling Harpsichord Concerto, a work first premiered by Kaprálová; the freely contrapuntal Tre ricercari, which draws on 18th-century models; and the First Piano Sonata, a late work characterized by its bold harmonies and freedom of rhythm and form.
Program
2 pm - Preconcert talk: Anna Harwell Celenza
3 pm - Performance: Brandon Patrick George, flute; Thomas English, bassoon; Zachary Silberschlag, trumpet; Andrey Gugnin & Orion Weiss, piano; Mahan Esfahani, harpsichord; Luosha Fang, violin; Balourdet Quartet; Bard Festival Chamber Players
Bohuslav Martinů (1890–1959)
La revue de cuisine, H161 (1927)
Piano Sonata No. 1, H350 (1954)
Harpsichord Concerto, H246 (1935)
Arthur Honegger (1892–1955)
Concerto da Camera, H196 (1948)
Aaron Copland (1900–90)
Sextet (1937)
Bohuslav Martinů
Tre ricercari, H267 (1938)
Location: Fisher Center, Sosnoff Theater
