Tschaikovskys Musical Influences
It has been interesting to read about the genesis of Tschaikovsky's Romeo and Juliet Overture. The piece was a commission of sorts from Milay Balakirev, and because Tschaikovsky belonged to the Anton Bruckner school of crippling self doubt, many of the major components of the work came from Balakirev's recommendation. It was Balakirev who outlined the Friar-Montegues vs. Capulets-Lovers structure of the work, ideas about keys and even sent Tschaikovsky an example of the dueling music. The first performance of this piece was on March 16, 1870 and its subdued reception (except for the love music) made him rewrite the piece more along Balakirev's recommendations. Though a greater success than first, it still did not reach its final form until 1880 when Tschaikovsky rewrote the ending to make it grander, a final concession to Balakirev's recommendations. The first section of the piece is the music associated with Friar Lawrence, and by extension music associated with the spiritual world. The quasi-liturgical chorale, itself a Balakirev suggested improvement over the first version's friar theme, begins first with interlocking clarinets and bassoons. Though the instrumental scope of this section broadens to include strings and higher woodwinds, the solemn rhythmically regular ten bar chorale is the predominant thematic voice throughout. It is presented twice first in this lower register and then with the high woodwinds over an active string accompaniment. By presenting this ten bar theme and the reprise in its entirety without any significant development, Tschaikovsky makes the friar's world hermetic, a completely different soundscape from the chaos of what comes after. In the middle of this section, achieved through a series of indistinct modulatory passages comes an extremely special and unusual moment. After a modulation down a half step to f minor, the previous quarter rhythm changes predominantly to half and whole notes and prepared by an exquisite half diminished chord, the harp makes an arresting entrance. This process is repeated another half step down to e minor. The sword and duel section is the complete antithesis of the introduction. Here Tschaikovsky emphasis rhythm and color with an openness and unpredictability of form. After a Beethovenian choir alternation of chords., the new duel music begins in earnest. Tschaikovsky, the quintessential ballet composer gives the music a punctuated drive. Starting in b minor, the extremely rhythmic motives with syncopated accents drive the music forward. This is the first time that the composer uses the whole orchestra. Tschaikovsky is not so concerned with melody and harmony here, rhythm and color are his main tools in creating the drama of the duel. Choir handovers , rushing string figures and continued iterations of fragments of the motive propel the section headlong. Like the first section, the duel features two complete presentations of the principal idea. Tschaikovsky maximizes tension in the passages leading up to that second presentation by separating the choirs. He has the strings play rushing sixteenth note figurations over syncopated woodwind and brass chords whose unpredictability and destabilizing effect make this passage sound breathless. It prepares well the full fury of the fortissimo restatement that the composer writes an octave higher than the first time. The third section is the most famous, even Balakirev liked it on first hearing ("I play it often, and I want very much to kiss you for it.") With a theme this striking, Tschaikovsky not only presents it three times but even gives it a developmental buildup during its second airing. This section is a study in, among other things, structural crescendo and decrescendo. The previous sections have all stayed within a fairly narrow emotional and dynamic compass. The first, quiet introspection and the second bombastic and explosive. Here Tschaikovsky begins by choosing a new color, the English horn and a new key Db (suggested by Balakirev). He gives his theme a soloistic opening statement by combining with the violas. That kind of mixed orchestration is new to the work and already prepares us for something different. The strings develop a quarter note middle ground accompaniment figure that keeps the theme prominent yet enveloped. In its second presentation the theme belongs alone to the flute and the oboe while the horn becomes the new middle ground taking the place of the strings who drop a dynamic and become more frankly accompaniment. The "longing" quality of the melody becomes emphasized by the flute and oboe lean poignantly on the first note of the theme. The theme itself also becomes expanded beyond its original eight bars and a kind of development and maturation takes place. This represents the growing longing of the title characters. As the development takes it higher, a natural crescendo starts to develop, one then encouraged by the composer when he writes it in a few bars later. All of this buildup climaxes at the bar before the return of the theme but as soon as their love is realized it must just as quickly be tamped down. Tschaikovsky dutifully calms the orchestra down and returns to pianos and pianissimos. At the climax of the work, when this theme is screamed out by the whole orchestra, Tschaikovsky shows the lovers in danger with the constant interruptions of the duel theme. He uses it again at the end against the piano timpani death knells and finally it comes in alternation with the final sounding of the Friar Lawrence theme and shows how their love passes from the emotional world to the spiritual one. Sammy Higgins lives in New York City where he works for http://www.operadepot.com Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Sammy_Higgins |
