Page 155 - GTMF 2024 Season Program

August 9 & 10
PROGRAM NOTES

Sergei Rachmaninoff

Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor, Op. 18

AT A GLANCE

Born: 1873
Died: 1943
Date of Composition: 1901
Instrumentation: Piano Concerto
No. 2 in C minor is scored for
2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets,
2 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets,
3 trombones, tuba, timpani,
percussion, strings and solo piano.

Sergei Rachmaninoff was what
show business types call a triple
threat: composer, pianist and
conductor all in one—and utterly
first-rate in all three. But triple
just might have been duple. His
protean gifts notwithstanding,
Rachmaninoff suffered mightily
from lapses in self-confidence,
particularly where composition
was concerned. He might have
jettisoned his compositional
ambitions altogether after the
1897 premiere of his Symphony
No. 1 in D minor, Op. 13. It was
a debacle, as a shamefully
incompetent performance under
a reportedly drunken Alexander
Glazunov had been followed
by a communal lashing from Sergei Rachmaninoff
Moscow critics. “If there were a
Conservatory in Hell, and one
of its students were to compose
a symphony…” began one and got him back on his impetus, Piano Concerto No. 2
particularly venomous review. compositional feet. At least that’s in C minor, Op. 18, completed in
the standard story. According to 1900, was the happy result. For
Three years of compositional the testimony of some who were once, life imitated a grade-B
paralysis followed. Posterity owes there at the time, it may not have movie as Rachmaninoff arose
a heartfelt shout-out to physician been Dr. Dahl’s fine hypnotherapy from his depression with a
Nikolai Dahl, who treated that did the trick so much as it massive hit that has remained
Rachmaninoff with daily was Dr. Dahl’s fine, comely young deeply popular from the get-go,
hypnotherapy for three months daughter. Whatever the actual even in the face of several

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