Shostakovich and Coleridge-Taylor

Dmitri Shostakovich: 5 Pieces for two violins and piano 
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V. Silvestrov: Sonata "Post Scriptum" for Violin and Piano
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Carl Baermann: Adagio in D flat major for Clarinet and Strings 

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor: Clarinet Quintet Op.10
I. Allegro energico 
II. Larghetto affettuoso - Molto espressivo 
III. Scherzo. Allegro leggiero
IV. Finale. Allegro agitato - Poco più moderato - Vivace

Date: March 6th, 2023
​Time: 7:30pm
Location: Sts Peters and Paul Cathedral 
Address: 1919 S 7th St, St. Louis, MO 63104
Admission: Free

Concert Artists

Eva Kozma / Violin

Alvin McCall / Cello

XiaoXiao Qiang / Violin

Chris Tantillo / Viola

Alla Voskoboynikova / Piano

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Hannah Ji / Violin

Scott Andrews / Clarinet

Dmitri Shostakovich: 5 Pieces for two violins and piano
Dimitri Shostakovich was born in 1906 in St. Petersburg of the Russian Empire. He showed promising talent as a composer and pianist from a young age and would write an immense amount of music during his lifetime. However, after the formation of the U.S.S.R Shostakovich would often struggle to maintain his career as a composer. His works were often censored, banned, or condemned by Russian newspapers, critics, and government officials. For a short time his famous Symphony No. 5, written in 1937, renewed his reputation and position as an upstanding Soviet composer. Unfortunately, in 1948 Shostakovich was accused of writing inappropriate and formalist music by Andrew Zhdav, Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR. This was perhaps one of the harshest blows of Shostakovich’s career. Most of his music was banned, he suffered a large loss of income, and feared arrest. When Stalin died in 1953, Shostakovich was finally released from some of the government’s restraints.
At some point during the 1960’s, Shostakovich began to suffer from ALS. He died in Moscow in 1975 of heart failure.
The music from Five Pieces for Two Violins and Piano was inspired by or taken directly from Shostakovich’s film scores, incidental music, and ballet music.

Carl Baermann: Adagio in D flat major for Clarinet and Strings
Carl Baermann was born in Munich, Germany and lived from 1810 until 1885. His father was principal clarinetist of the Munich court orchestra, and by the age of 14 Baermann was also performing on the clarinet with the court orchestra. He would later succeed his father as principal. Baermann was famous for developing the Baermann-Ottensteiner key system for the clarient and for developing the Vollständige Clarinett-Schule (Complete School for the Clarinet). Baermann wrote many pieces for virtuoso clarinet players.

Silvestrov: Sonata "Post Scriptum" for Violin and Piano
Valentin Vasylyovych Sylvestrov was born in 1937, in what at the time was known as Kyiv, Ukrainian SSR. From 1955-58 Sylvestrov trained to become a civil engineer while taking piano lessons at the Kyiv Evening Music School. However, in 1958 he began studies in composition at the Kyiv Conservatory and went on to have a career as a music teacher and freelance composer. He moved to Berlin at the onset of the Russian invasion of the Ukraine in 2022.Post-scriptom is best described by the composer himself as
“‘ a postscript to Mozart and the whole classical tradition. The text has already been written. We simply add our annotations, thoughts, questions, consternation, astonishment and regret. The classical phonemes begin to waft through other times and
spaces. There is no longer such a thing as the ability to predict what something means,
and its place is taken by a mysterious symbolism.”’
(Frumkis, Tatiana. “Description.” 31, December is 1999. https://www.all-sheetmusic.com/Strings/Violin/Post-Scriptum-Download.html)

​Samuel Coleridge-Taylor: Clarinet Quintet Op.10
Samuel Coleridge - Taylor was an English composer who lived from 1875 until 1912. His mother was an English woman, and his father was a descendant of African American slaves who resettled in Sierra Leone after the Revolutionary War. They never married, and Samuel grew up with his mother’s musical family. His relatives took notice of his musical talent from a young age and sent him to study at the Royal College of Music when he was only 15. Already an accomplished violinist, he began to study composition. Within a few years he was appointed professor of music to the Crystal Palace School of Music and became the conductor at the Croydon Conservatory. By the time Samuel was 21 his composition career was flourishing. Several of his works were premiered, including Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast, the first of a three part cantata based on Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s The Song of Hiawatha. Hiawatha would become his most popular composition during his lifetime.
In 1904 President Roosevelt invited Coleridge-Taylor to tour the United States and present performances of his music. Coleridge-Taylor’s popularity grew, and he frequently returned to the United States in the early 1900’s. According to anecdotal accounts from 1910, the white orchestral musicians that performed his music in New York gave Coleridge-Taylor the nickname “the African Mahler”. His life was cut short by a deadly bout of pneumonia at the age of 37. There is speculation that anxiety from financial troubles also contributed to the cause of his early death. Although Coleridge-Taylor’s music was widely performed and supported by many, he struggled to earn a livable income. He sold the rights to Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast early in his career, and although the piece sold hundreds of thousands of copies, Coleridge-Taylor never received any royalties.
Coleridge-Taylor was influenced by the composers Brahms and Dvorak. Dvorak considered African American spiritual melodies to be the foundation of American music. Dvorak was so moved by the spirituals that he set out to write one of his own. Dvorak’s spiritual became the theme of the second movement, “Largo”, from his New World Symphony. Dvorak was an advocate for African American musicians and their music and an inspiration for black composers.
Brahms completed his clarinet quintet, his final chamber work, in 1891. Soon after its premiere, Coleridge-Taylor accepted a challenge initiated by his composition teacher to compose his own version of a clarinet quintet. Although Brahms’ grand musical gestures had an obvious effect on Coleridge-Taylor’s clarinet quintet, the more obvious influence was Dvorak’s use of folk melodies. Throughout Coleridge-Taylor’s quintet the use of folk-ish sounding melodies creates rustic, lively characters and soaring hymn-like musical themes.