Smetana, Piazzolla & Brahms: Nov 21–23, 2025
- cbeeson69
- 3 days ago
- 5 min read
Updated: 1 day ago
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Bedřich Smetana
"Vltava" - The Moldau
Bedřich Smetana (1824-1884) was a Czech composer and pianist of the Romantic era. He was interested in music performance and composition from a very early age and although he first attempted a career teaching and as a touring performer he returned to composition where he eventually found his strongest footing and secured his legacy as the “father of Czech music".
Highlights:
Smetana composed Má vlast (My Fatherland in English) between 1874 and 1879. It is a collection of six pieces for symphony orchestra that depict scenes, legends, or the history of Bohemia in a tone poem format.
The pieces are:
Vyšehrad (The High Castle)
Vltava (The Moldau)
Šárka, (a legendary female warrior)
Z českých luhů a hájů (From Bohemia's Woods and Fields)
Tábor (a town in the South Bohemian region)
Blaník (an impressive mountain containing a legendary Czech army inside on stand-by… would that be sorta like a Czech NORAD???)
These six pieces can be performed as a set but are most often performed individually. Due to their nationalistic qualities and Smetana’s commitment to elevating an individualized Czech cultural identity, Má vlast has opened the Prague Spring International Music Festival, held on the anniversary of Smetana’s death each year since 1952.
The second of these, Vltava, The Moldau, is the most often performed of the set.
Smetana intentionally composed the music as a tone painting depiction of the flow of Vltava, or Moldau river, from its humble beginning to its majestic end. From Smetana’s own description: “The composition describes the course of the Vltava, starting from two small springs, to the unification of both streams into a single current, the course of the Vltava through woods and meadows, through landscapes where a farmer's wedding is celebrated, the round dance of the mermaids in the night's moonshine: on the nearby rocks loom proud castles, palaces and ruins aloft. The Vltava swirls into the St. John's Rapids; then it widens and flows toward Prague, and majestically vanishes into the distance, ending at the Elbe.”
A typical performance of The Moldau lasts about 13 minutes.
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Astor Piazzolla
"Cuatros Estaciones Porteños"
Astor Piazzolla (1921-1992 ) was an Argentine composer and bandoneón performer, primarily of the tango tradition. He was heavily influenced by multiple genres of music from early childhood including classical and jazz, and showed a nearly immediate gift for the bandoneón, a type of accordion with buttons instead of a keyboard used in tango orchestras.
About the music:
Astor Piazzolla’s Cuatros Estaciones Porteños (“The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires”), is a set of four pieces composed individually between 1965 and 1970. In their original form they were composed for violin, piano, electric guitar, acoustic bass, and of course his instrument, the bandoneón. Piazzolla and his quintet performed them individually or sometimes together, but they weren’t meant to strictly be heard as a set.
When Piazzolla and the quintet performed them as a set the order was Otoño Porteño (Autumn), Invierno Porteño (Winter), Primavera Porteño (Spring), and finally Verano Porteño (Summer), even though this was not the order in which Piazzolla composed them.
Piazzolla first composed Verano Porteño in 1965 to be used as incidental music for the Alberto Muñoz play ‘Melenita do oro’. The following three: Invierno, Primavera, and Otoño were written primarily in 1969 and completed in 1970.
Between 1996 and 1998, composer Leonid Desyatnikov made a new arrangement of Piazzolla’s “Estaciones" in collaboration with violinist Gidon Kremer. This arrangement reflects Antonio Vivaldi’s Four Seasons in a few notable ways. Most obviously, he orchestrated it for solo violin and string orchestra, the same instrumentation Vivaldi used. Less obviously, he shaped each of Piazzolla’s pieces into a 3 part structure to reflect Vivaldi’s 3 movement structure for each of the Seasons. Desyatnikov also includes references and quotes from Vivaldi in imaginative ways in each of the four pieces. Some fun ‘easter eggs’ to listen for if you’re familiar with the Vivaldi!
Other things to listen for are special effects like swooping energetic slides, a scratching technique called ‘lija’, and tapping or snapping sounds which evoke the percussive effects found in tango groups.
A typical performance lasts about 25 minutes.
Resources:
Please note: Due to unforseen circumstances, Kerson Leong is replacing the originally scheduled violin soloist. He is amazing. You won't be disappointed!
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Johannes Brahms
Symphony No. 2
DIVE IN!
Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) was a German composer, pianist, and conductor during the Romantic stylistic era. Brahms was relentlessly committed to composition and notoriously shy. He even grew the enormous beard he’s known for in part to have something to hide behind!
It took him 21 years (!!) to complete his first symphony. Luckily that seemed to have broken through whatever barrier was there since his Symphony No. 2 took only a few months to complete.
Brahms is sometimes grouped with Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven as one of the "Three Bs" of classical music, a comment originally made by the nineteenth-century conductor Hans von Bülow who probably wanted to be the fourth B… 🤓
Random factoid: his father’s name was Johann Jakob, John Jacob (but not, unfortunately Jingleheimer Schmidt) 🫣😂😂
About the Music:
Brahms composed Symphony No. 2 in the summer of 1877 while enjoying some fresh air at an Austrian lakeside resort town.
Symphony No. 2 is in four movements:
Allegro non troppo [quick, not too much] - about 17 minutes
Adagio non troppo [slow, not too much] - about 10 minutes
Allegretto grazioso [a bit quick and light] - about 5 minutes
Allegro con spirito [quick with spirit] - about 10 minutes
The first movement contains a 'hidden in plain sight' familiar tune. Listen for an adaptation of his famous "Wiegenlied" lullaby melody as a contrasting theme to the more muscular material around it.
Symphony No. 2 features some beautiful and powerful woodwind and brass solos, but possibly the most dramatic moment comes from the cello section playing the opening melody of the second movement. Revel in the glory of the cello section as they show the incredible range of expression Brahms calls for.
Even though there are troubling gestures and a persistent capitulation between major and minor tonalities within this otherwise pastoral and contemplative work, it finishes in celebratory joy.
A typical performance of Symphony No. 2 lasts about 45 minutes.
Resources:
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