THINGS THAT GO BUMP

Composed 1771, by Luigi Boccherini (1743-1805).

Luigi Boccherini found his way to a career as a composer through his virtuoso playing. Boccherini, who was born in Italy but who eventually spent most of his career on the relative fringes of European cultural society in a small town near the Gredos mountains of Spain, was a cellist; but the position of the cello in his body of work is relatively conventional. Boccherini wrote an enormous number of cello sonatas. Forty-three survive, but the number is misleading because most of his works for cello were for his own personal use. He never gave them an opus number, did not include them in his own list of his works, and made no attempt to have them published; it’s possible that the ones that are published were made public without his permission. The difference between his personal cello sonatas and his public compositions is telling: the sonatas are conservative, whereas his public compositions are demanding and modern.

He held himself to a high standard for his public compositions, and had an accordingly high impression of their value. His arrival in Spain brought him first to the court of Madrid, where the Prince who would become Charles IV was in the habit of playing the principal violin parts in new music– not, it can be assumed from the following account, particularly well. During a reading of a new quartet of Boccherini’s, he objected strenuously to a passage in which the first violin plays the same two notes over and over. Boccherini pointed out that the melody was in the second violin and viola parts, and the first violinist should therefore devote his energy in that passage to listening to his fellows. The Prince decreed this to be “gross ignorance” on the part of the composer, to which Boccherini replied, “Before passing such a judgment, one ought at least to be a musician.” The hulking Prince threw the scrawny composer across the room, and was prevented from killing him only by the intervention of his wife. After a similar incident involving the elder Charles – in which the King ordered him to change a part that he disliked and Boccherini instead made the offending passage twice as long – the composer wisely agreed to follow his only remaining royal admirer, Infante Luis, to his little country court.

The same staunch integrity that got him in trouble with self-important royals is on display in the Casa del diavolo symphony. The “devil’s house” symphony could have belaboured the point with dissonances and tritones, famously known as the “Devil’s interval.” But the symphony is more subtle than that, with a third movement that Boccherini either developed on the theme of the infernal ballet from Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice, or (the composition dates of the two are unclear) perhaps that served to inspire it. The symphony is nevertheless full of high drama; the kind of flight from powerful mischief that – for instance – a spurned composer might make from the power of devilish kings and princes.

Note by Anna Norris

Composed 1713, by Giuseppe Tartini (1692 - 1770)

First written sometime between 1713 and the 1740's, ‘The Devil’s Trill’ is a violin sonata composed by Giuseppe Tartini. The story of the piece is rooted in a dream Tartini had in which he supposedly met with the devil. Here’s how he described it to his friend, astronomer, Jérôme Lalande: "One night, in the year 1713 I dreamed I had made a pact with the devil for my soul. Everything went as I wished: my new servant anticipated my every desire. Among other things, I gave him my violin to see if he could play. How great was my astonishment on hearing a sonata so wonderful and so beautiful, played with such great art and intelligence, as I had never even conceived in my boldest flights of fantasy. I felt enraptured, transported, enchanted: my breath failed me, and I awoke. I immediately grasped my violin in order to retain, in part at least, the impression of my dream. In vain! The music which I at this time composed is indeed the best that I ever wrote, and I still call it the 'Devil's Trill', but the difference between it and that which so moved me is so great that I would have destroyed my instrument and have said farewell to music forever if it had been possible for me to live without the enjoyment it affords me."

Many scholars believe that due to the maturity of its compositional style, Tartini may have written the sonata at a later date than the stated 1713. Regardless of when it was composed, listeners have long enjoyed the theatrical, and beautiful nature of ‘The Devil’s Trill’. It has been performed by countless violinists since its publication in 1799 and is significant in the repertoire. Even famed violinist Fritz Kreisler could not resist its charm and added an orchestration of strings and organ to broaden the scope of the work.

As someone who crosses between modern and baroque violin daily, I have enjoyed the challenge of employing as much of Tartini’s original material as possible, while also leaning into Kreisler’s lush soundscape. While Kreisler didn’t change too many of the actual notes, he made significant changes to the articulations and phrasing. He also added a cadenza as well as a dramatic ending. Both Tartini and Kreisler were real showmen and used this music to bring something exotic and thrilling to the stage. The trilling passage in the fourth movement, for example, is marked ‘the trill of the devil’; here Tartini writes for the performer to play a series of notes on one string with several fingers while simultaneously trilling (or fluttering between two notes) with other fingers on another string. This is incredibly difficult and proves challenging for any violinist. To add my voice, I replaced Kreisler’s cadenza with one of my own. All this while focusing on the essence of Tartini’s dream in which he was astounded by the beauty of the music he heard.

Note by the soloist, Elisa Wicks

Composed 1946 by William Grant Still (1895 - 1978)

Long known as the "dean of African-American classical Composers," as well as one of America's foremost composers, William Grant Still has had the distinction of becoming a legend in his own lifetime. On May 11, 1895, he was born in Woodville (Wilkinson County) Mississippi, to parents who were teachers and musicians. They were of Negro, Indian, Spanish, Irish and Scotch bloods. When William was only a few months old, his father died and his mother took him to Little Rock, Arkansas, where she taught English in the high school. There his musical education began – with violin lessons from a private teacher, and with later inspiration from the Red Seal operatic recordings bought for him by his stepfather.

Dr. Still's service to the cause of brotherhood is evidenced by his many firsts in the musical realm: Still was the first Afro-American in the United States to have a symphony performed by a major symphony orchestra. He was the first to conduct a major symphony orchestra in the United States, when in 1936, he directed the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra in his compositions at the Hollywood Bowl. He was the first Afro-American to conduct a major symphony orchestra in the Deep South in 1955, when he directed the New Orleans Philharmonic at Southern University. He was the first of his race to conduct a White radio orchestra in New York City. He was the first to have an opera produced by a major company in the United States, when in 1949, his Troubled Island was done at the City Center of Music and Drama in New York City. He was the first to have an opera televised over a national network. With these firsts, Still was a pioneer, but, in a larger sense, he pioneered because he was able to create music capable of interesting the greatest conductors of the day: truly serious music, but with a definite American flavor.

Phantom Chapel is the first of two movements from a work, Bells, which was originally written by Still for piano before being orchestrated for full orchestra.

Note by Dr. Still’s estate

Composed 1960, by Bernard Hermann (1911 - 1975)

The shrieking strings of Bernard Hermann's score for Psycho are among the most famous sounds in all of cinema; and yet, the most famous musical moment – the shower scene where Marion is murdered – was almost left out of the film entirely. Hitchcock initially conceived the scene as being entirely silent. When the director lamented that he was unhappy with how the scene was coming along, Hitchcock slyly presented what he had written, and history was made.

This exemplifies the relationship between Hermann and Hitchcock, a composer normally known for planning down to the most minute detail left the music unusually open for Hermann. We are fortunate that he did, as the convention-defying music perfectly accompanied the truly radical film – it's hard to imagine now, but killing off the star of the movie in the first act was nigh-unthinkable at the time. And Hermann's music would go on to set the sound of the slasher film genre for decades to come.

Note by Jacob Pope

Composed 1994, by Miguel del Aguila (b. 1957)

Miguel del Aguila heard the music for Conga-Line in Hell before he knew the title of the piece. He writes, “At first there was the visual image of an endless line of dead people dancing through the fire of hell. I gradually started hearing the music, which was flowing spontaneously out of me in an effort to entertain and alleviate the pain of those poor souls. I woke up and wrote the music as I remembered it.” The twinkling sounds of the orchestra in the opening evoke images of a spooky moonlit night where shadows threaten to hide ghosts, goblins, and ghouls. Shortly after setting this scene, the “humorous” and “sarcastic” sounds from the percussion hint at the development of an enticing conga song. Aguila continues, “I rely mainly on the dramatic and expressive qualities of rhythm to convey the evil forces that govern my imaginary hell.” A typical conga rhythm is felt in a straight eighth 4/4 meter, but Aguila distorts the rhythm throughout with a 3/16 pattern, adding to the manic sensations of a crazed dance party. The skeletons are drawn out of their graves.

After a brief Gershwin-esque musical interlude, our attention returns to the conga, but this time, it develops into a raucous scene characterized by the Latin mantuno or tumbao patterns in the piano. The dissonant harmonies of the strings and the rude interruptions by the brass make us question how the piece will end (It also reminds me of Bernstein’s “Mambo” from West Side Story). It would seem the music will only continue to build, forcing the hell-dwellers to conga for all eternity, overcome with the spell of the rhythms and jazz harmonies. From the soft opening, to the romantic middle, and all the way to the surprising end, this piece takes us on a journey to the underworld where perhaps the inhabitants are tortured by their unquenchable thirst to dance.

Three-time Grammy-nominated Uruguayan-American composer Miguel del Aguila has written over 115 works, most of which draw on his Latin-American roots. Recordings of his works have topped the billboards of classical platforms. The New Juilliard Ensemble’s recording of Conga-Line in Hell currently has close to half a million streams across online commercial platforms worldwide. He continues to write commissioned works for orchestras around the world.

Note by Jenna Hunt