Quiz: Mystery scores

[karlhenning]

Well, you know, it's not like you absolutely have to deregister first.

Note taken. (Indeed.)

[greg]

Luke is back?


!!!

[Guido]

Oh. My. God.

[sul G]

@ Greg   

@ Guido   

[sul G]

So, fellas, how are we doing on these? Clues? Here are some quick ones to some of the remaining; I'll go through the others later...

404 - just a small thing, this
405 - I mock you. I ask you.
406 - c.w. above
409 - I'm waiting for you..
411 - Guido, you know this.
412/412a - I didn't think this would be hard. Luke set one of these before, and it looked similar. Don't forget that 412a is a homage, and it's fairly clear who to.
413 - genus Dacelo, perhaps
414 - genus Luscinia megarhynchos, certanily. The top line of the score is the big clue, but this is extremely famous

[Maciek]

'Furthermentioning

I'll definitely try to find some way of squeezing that word in.

[Guido]

409 - Janacek Intimate Sketches - I await you!

411 - Janacek Violin Concerto

[sul G]

409 - Janacek Intimate Sketches - I await you!

411 - Janacek Violin Concerto

Well, the 409 Janacek doesn't actually come from a collection at all, though it's been published with other Janacek tinies, sketches, fragments and juvenilia in a book to which the publisher did give the name Intimate Sketches. Its Czech name is Cekam Te, and it's Janacek's very last piece, left incomplete. The 'you' he is waiting for is Kamila, of course; and it was during a visit of hers to Janacek in Hukvaldy that the composer died.

The Concerto is correct - in piano reduction here, of course.

[Guido]

I'll give some more clues for mine. All of these are fairly famous composers, certainly known amongst people here.

no.2 is by a very famous composer, though song writing is't generally what he is known for.

no.3 is atypical of the composer in its bare simplicity, but there are definite stylistic clues here, as well as the use of the solo instrument.

no.4 is actually a bit of a cheat, as it is an arrangement of an orchestral piece by the composer, his last orchestral work in fact, and this is the most beautiful movement of it. Below is another excerpt from it - this time the opening of that movement.

no.5 - may not be all it seems... the solo instrument usually has other markings...

[Guido]

Well, the 409 Janacek doesn't actually come from a collection at all, though it's been published in a book with other Janacek tinies, sketches, fragments and juvenilia which to which the publisher gave the name Intimate Sketches. Its Czech name is Cekam Te, and it's Janacek's very last piece, left incomplete. The 'you' he is waiting for is Kamila, of course; and it was during a visit of hers to Janacek in Hukvaldy that the composer died.

The Concerto is correct - in piano reduction here, of course.

I should have got the concerto straight away of course. For some reason I was just thrown by the way it looked on the page...

Why was Janacek so obsessed by Kamila? was he trying to recapture his youth? EDIT: Obviously far too simplistic, but there's a certain sadness to it in many ways...

[karlhenning]

Feels great to be so entirely lost again! 

[Guido]

but there's a certain sadness to it in many ways...

Actually it's desperately sad. But somehow this forbidden love had the power to inspire masterpiece after masterpiece for 10 years, in a way which I don't think could have been expected from his works up to that date...

[sul G]

That no 4 of yours is the second movement of Moeran's Serenade in G, of course.

Regarding Kamila - as you say, a complex issue, and despite all his (often beautiful) letters to her, it's still a bit of a mystery. He certainly idealised her - she represented a certain 'type' for him (dark, 'gypsy-like' - see the Diary of One Who Disappeared) and it may even be that he rather blocked out the real Kamila for this ideal image, which was certainly 'working for him'.

[Guido]

That no 4 of yours is the second movement of Moeran's Serenade in G, of course.

Regarding Kamila - as you say, a complex issue, and despite all his (often beautiful) letters to her, it's still a bit of a mystery. He certainly idealised her - she represented a certain 'type' for him (dark, 'gypsy-like' - see the Diary of One Who Disappeared) and it may even be that he rather blocked out the real Kamila for this ideal image, which was certainly 'working for him'.

The whole story about him buying the paintings of cherubs by her husband then writing to her saying they were "our children" sort of borders the realm of stalker like obsession or even madness; also his comments on the Second String quartet in which he says she is giving birth to their child in the second(?) movement... It's astonishing that someone with such an obviously deep and profound understanding of people and relationships would express on the one hand such naive and childlike simplicity and on the other Aspergerian inappropriateness and lack of understanding of the mental and emotional states of others. Or he did understand, but couldn't help himself (perhaps more likely), preferring to create his own world - was his own marriage loveless? And what about Kamila's husband - what did he think of all these shenanigans?

This naivity mixed with a supreme profundity of thought reminds me a lot of Ives, though his thought was focussed in another sphere - that of 'the people', art, and the future. He could not accept the second world war.

(his love life was no where near as complicated! But again the theme of human love was of primary importance to him - In their private theology, his and Harmony's love had taught them both divine love, and taught him how to spread that love to the world through his music)

[sul G]

Certainly, it was all very odd. Though I think those comments need to be read 1) as coming from an earlier age, 2) as being written by a man whose forms of expression were always startlingly direct and original, and 3) as being part of a private language (much as you talk about Mr and Mrs Ives and their 'private theology'). Kamila's own role in this all is more unclear, unfortunately. It would help if we knew more about her side of things; her feelings can hardly have been of the same intensity or type as his, but she (and her husband, AFAIK) were flattered by the association with a famous composer. As for Janacek's wife, that's a rather sad and bitter story - they had been in love, early on, but eventually divorced, though continuing to live together. Zdenka's own memoirs paint Janacek in a bad light in some ways; but they too can't be taken at face value - there was so much history, so much under the surface. The truth is probably somewhere in between.

I'm not as up on the details of Janacek biography as I ought to be, and my memory can't be trusted to give you chapter and verse on this. I have the relevant books - the Stosslova letters, and Zdenka's memoirs, both edited by John Tyrell, with the latter's typically comprehensive introduction and notes - but at the moment I've lent them to my mother as the letters contain mention of Max Brod and specifically (and unusually - usually it's only Max who is spoken of) his wife, who was my mother's aunt. He talks of Brod's wife and his talking together - and as both had husbands with wandering eyes, one can imagine their conversations. All rather sad.

[karlhenning]

Most interesting, thanks!

[sul G]

Guido, I think your Russian song is Stravinsky's Four Russian Songs (no 2). Actually, Stravinsky was my first thought when I saw this score, but I couldn't place the songs.

[Guido]

You are right! Just came accross the score and thought it looked pretty so included it. Have never heard the piece - I should dig out the Stravinsky boxed set song CD - he wrote something like 40 songs I think, which I found surprising.

Just noticed the Moeran contains not a single accidental in those first three lines... Amazing stuff - it's just so magically beautiful.

[sul G]

It's modal, you see. It's the way of the future. (Not unusual to find pages as accidental free as this in British music of that time - there are pieces by Howells which are similar, for instance).

[Guido]

It's modal, you see. It's the way of the future. (Not unusual to find pages as accidental free as this in British music of that time - there are pieces by Howells which are similar, for instance).

Yes, I know it's modal - I know that this is one of the aspects of English writing of this time which appeals to me the most (though I have no real idea how it works technically). And false relations! I still don't really understand why modality doesn't 'collapse' into the the key of the key signature (the key from which the modes' scale is derived) - like here E minor - how does one avoid the pull of the A minor chord to E?

Just looked through the whole score: there isn't a single sccidental in the whole movement. That luminous ending!