Page 112 - PDF Flip TR Program Demo

112
The Music at Tippet Rise
ABOUT THE PROGRAMBENJAMIN PESETSKY
DOMENICO SCARLATTI (1685–1757) Sonata in F Minor, K. 519
Sonata in C-sharp Minor, K. 247 Sonata in F Major, K. 17
The keyboard music of Domenico Scarlatti comes down to us in hand-copied volumes made for his patron and student, Princess Maria Bárbara of Portugal, who later became queen of Spain. Upon her death, she left them to Farinelli, the castrato, and they now rest in libraries in Venice and Parma. Some collections were published in Scarlatti’s lifetime— both in legitimate and pirated copies—and a small number of his pieces were known and appreciated by 19th-century pianists, including Clementi, Liszt, and Clara Schumann. But until his sonatas were collected and edited by 20th- century scholars, Scarlatti was better known by historical reputation than for his actual body of work.
The three sonatas on today’s program come from different sources and different periods of Scarlatti’s life, though they can’t be precisely dated. The Sonatas in
F Minor and C-sharp Minor are found in Bárbara’s manuscript volumes, suggesting that they were written for her and composed—or at least compiled—late in Scarlatti’s life. The Sonata in F Major, published in a collection of 30 Essercizi (exercises) dedicated to João V in 1738, is probably an earlier composition.
Scarlatti’s sonatas predate the classical idea of the sonata
as a large-scale, multi-movement work. He never indicated particular groupings of pieces, perhaps suggesting that performers should curate their own. The F-minor Sonata, K. 519 has a sense of urgency—rushing forward, then set- tling into a gallop. The Sonata in C-sharp Minor, K. 247 is more cerebral, showing Scarlatti’s inventive wanderings and musical questioning. The F-major Sonata, K. 17 has two contrasting voices: one exuberant and feisty, the other slinky and coy.
Born in 1685 (the same year as Bach and Handel), Domenico was the sixth child of Alessandro Scarlatti, who was also a renowned composer. Domenico made his early career in his native Naples, as well as in other Italian cities. One story describes him meeting Handel in Venice, where they engaged in a friendly musical contest. The audience decided that Handel was the superior organist, while Scarlatti had a slight edge on harpsichord. The story is plausible and prescient: while Handel and Bach were champions of all the keyboards, Scarlatti was more narrowly influential in the history of domestic stringed keyboard instruments. His sonatas were intended for cembalo (harpsichord) or clavichord (a smaller, softer instrument), and he was also familiar with the very earliest pianos made by Bartolomeo Cristofori.
In 1719, Scarlatti moved to Lisbon, where he took up a royal appointment for João V of Portugal. He taught Princess Bárbara, a gifted student of music, and later followed her to Spain, where she married Ferdinand VI and became queen.
HENRY COWELL (1897–1965)
Aeolian Harp
Henry Cowell was one of the first composers to ask pianists to directly manipulate the piano strings as a kind of harp. This discovery (or at least, legitimization of what troublesome piano students do naturally) built on his earli- er invention of tone clusters (fists or elbows hitting adjacent piano keys) and predated John Cage’s more radical development of prepared piano (placing objects on the strings) by 15 years.
In 1923, Cowell published Aeolian Harp, the first of his “string piano” pieces. The sound production technique is avant-garde—the pianist silently holds down keys while strumming the strings, allowing the specified chords to resonate. But the music itself feels antiquarian, built