|
Stars of the Future
featuring the Grand Prize Winners of the Symphony's Vernell Gregg Young Artists' Competition Alison Chiang and Anna McDonald
The concert is
sponsored by Bill and Friday, February 8, 2008 at 7:30pm
At Lakeland Baptist Church, Lewisville. 397 South Stemmons, Lewisville TX 75067 (Directions)
Adults $25, Senior $ (60+) $20, student $10 Special UNT student rate $5
Adron Ming, conductor Alison Chiang, piano Anna McDonald, piano
Beethoven: Symphony No. 1 in C Major, Op.21 I. Adagio molto; Allegro con brio II. Andante cantabile con moto III. Allegro molto e vivace IV. Adagio; Allegro molte e vivace
Ravel: Piano Concerto in G Major I. Allegramente Ms. McDonald, Piano
Fifteen-Minute Intermission
Rossini: Overture to “Il Signor Bruschino” Saint-Saëns: Piano Concerto No. 2 in G Minor, Op. 22 I. Andante Sostenuto-un poco animato Ms. Chiang, Piano
More on Anna McDonald and Alison Chiang More on Beethoven | Ravel | Rossini | Saint-Saëns
Competition judges: Maestro Adron Ming,plus Prof, George Papich, and Prof. John Scott of the College of Music at the University of North Texas
Pianist Anna McDonald, began studying the piano at age 5 with her mother. Since that time, she has performed successfully in numerous piano festivals by consistently being awarded high scores and has been a top prize winner of many local and multi state piano competitions.
During the 2007 school year she was named a winner in the local and district round of the TMTA Student Affiliate Piano Competitions and competed at the TMTA State piano competition performing the 1st movement of Ravels Concerto in G major. In the fall of 2007 she and her brother Randal were invited by Steinway Hall to perform in conjunction with the James Barron’s presentation of his book, The Making of the Steinway D.
Anna is the youngest of five siblings, all brothers, who have or are studying classical piano. She is home educated and is a sophomore in high school. In her spare time she enjoys spending time with friends, reading, and sailing with her father, singing in her church high school choir and accompanying for the children’s choirs at PCPC.
Alison Chiang was born in Rochester, New York on May 4th 1992, and began playing piano at age 5. At 7, she won first prize in the 1999 St. Charles Illinois State Music Competition. Alison moved with her family in 2000 to Cleveland, Ohio, where she studied piano with Miss Olga Radosavljevich and music theory with Ms. Adeline Huss, both at the Cleveland Institute of Music. She played as a program opener for the 2000 season of the Urbana-Champaign Symphony Orchestra.
She had been an honored recipient of the Olga Radosavljevich Scholarship from the Cleveland Institute of Music from 2001 to 2007. In July 2007, she moved with her family to Plano, Texas. She presently studies piano with Dr. Pamela Mia Paul at University of North Texas. Now 15, she is a 10th grader at Shepton High School in Plano, Texas.
Symphony No. 1 in C Major, Op. 21Ludwig van BeethovenI. Adagio molto: Allegro con brio II. Andante cantabile con moto III. Menuetto: Allegro molto e vivace IV. Finale: Allegro molto e vivace
Adagio Molto: Allegro con brio. The symphony commences with a dominant seventh chord leading into F major. This was audacious and almost revolutionary for 1800 because traditionally the main tonality (C major, in this case) would be unmistakably expressed at the initial phase of the movement. Not until it ends does the adagio finally settle into the chief key of C major.
Andante cantabile con moto. This movement is full of grace and warmth that evokes the so-called style gallant of the eighteenth century. Noteworthy is the delicate use of tympani which marks a Mozartian feature of orchestration.
Menuetto: Allegro molto e vivace. Beethoven called the third movement “minuet” but this title is misleading: this music is not akin to the courtly dance that found its way into the early classical symphony. In essence the movement is a scherzo and represents a new form type which was one of Beethoven’s most characteristic contributions to the cyclic form.
Finale: Allegro molto e vivace. The finale is a sonata-rondo preceded by an adagio. Like the introduction to the first movement, the opening of this movement irked the audiences of 1800. In performances following the premiere the opening adagio was eliminated but has long since been restored.
Born on December 17, 1770 in Bonn Died on March 26, 1827 in Vienna Ludwig van Beethoven was born in Bonn in 1770. His father, a music enthusiast, dreamed of molding his son into the next Mozart. Beethoven never exhibited the astonishing prodigy characteristics of his predecessor, but he was unusually talented, learning the piano, organ and violin at an early age. At 14, he was already proficient enough on the organ to receive a professional appointment. His family life was chaotic which compelled him to leave home in 1790 and travel to Vienna to study with Haydn, and where he remained for the rest of his life.
Beethoven was a master symphonist – the master symphonist in the eyes of most performers and composers. His orchestral compositions were revolutionary in his day; while he adhered to Classical musical forms, his melodies and orchestration were of such unprecedented power and beauty that they astonished even the most hardened listeners. Always profound, inspiring and essentially tragic, his music defined the limits of human expressiveness in sound.
In 1799 he felt the first symptoms of deafness which his doctors could do nothing to halt. By 1820 he was completely deaf. Despite this, and mounting personal problems, Beethoven had a creative outburst after 1818 that produced some of his greatest works, including the Ninth Symphony. At the premier performance of the Ninth Symphony in 1824 he was completely deaf and could neither hear the music as it was performed nor the enthusiastic applause from the audience. A friend turned him around and the audience responded by waving handkerchiefs, hats and hands in the air so Beethoven could see their ovation gestures.
Piano Concerto in G MajorMaurice Ravel1. Allegramente Anna McDonald, Piano Despite writing a great deal of music for solo piano, Ravel wrote only two piano concertos. They were his last major compositions and he worked on them simultaneously in 1930 and 1931. Compared to the other concerto, which is a dark, brooding piece, richly scored for large orchestra in one movement, the Concerto in G Major seems simple and normal. It is much more transparent in its sound, with the first and third movements showing the influence of jazz (and Gershwin in particular).
Allegramente. Ravel originally wanted to call this concerto a “Divertissement”. It opens with the crack of a whip, or slapstick, followed by a perky tune on the piccolo and then the trumpet (all the time accompanied by delicate arpeggios on the piano). The slower section which follows, with occasional blue notes and trombone smears, sounds influenced by Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. After another fast section with a brief piano cadenza, a second slower section occurs with unusual sounds for the harp. The momentum is soon regained as the work proceeds to an energetic close.
Born on March 7, 1875 in Ciboure, France Died on December 28, 1937 in Paris, France
Ravel’s most productive period was during his 30’s. A rivalry developed between Ravel and Claude Debussy which created a style of music partly inspired by the Impressionist paintings of Claude Monet. Though a brilliant orchestrator, several of Ravel’s works were first written for piano.
After his service in World War I, Ravel captured the flavor of the end of an era in his La Valse. Fragile health in the last 17 years of his life reduced the volume of compositions, but not the quality. His last major effort was a pair of piano concertos, the exuberant Concerto in G major, and a second piano concerto which was written for left hand only.
Overture to Il Signor Bruschino Gioacchino Rossini
Few of his operas remain in the repertoire, and his music is mostly known today for a few overtures which consist of melodic charm and vitality. Such is the Overture to Il Signor Bruschino, a one-act opera based on the well-tried theme of mistaken identity that was first performed in Venice in 1813.
The Overture to Il Signor Bruschino is written in traditional sonata form (actually sonatina form because Rossini seldom took time in the overtures to his fast-paced comedies to bother with a development section). One unique factor in this work is that Rossini introduced the novel effect of having the second violins tap on the music stands with their bows – a daring experiment in search of new tonal effects. This overture is one of the earliest and most engaging evidences of the talent that made Rossini among the most successful (and wealthy) composers of the nineteenth century.
Born on February 29, 1792 in Pesaro, Italy Died on November 13, 1868 in Passy, France
Rossini began his operatic composing career at age 18 when he wrote a one-act comedy that was performed in Venice. Numerous commissions followed including Le pietra del paragone which was a success at La Scala in 1812. His first operas to win international acclaim, written in 1813, were Tancredi and L’italiana in Algeri. He is best remembered for Il barbiere di Siviglia and Guillaume Tell.
Rossini’s standing among the world’s composers has often been debated. The melodic and fanciful frills of his music have been used as arguments against classing him with some of the great composers, such as Mozart and Beethoven. Yet, his music has an appeal that causes it to be performed with some frequency for contemporary audiences.
Piano ConcertoNo. 2 in G Minor, Op. 22Camille Saint-Saens1. Andante sostenuto Alison Chiang, Piano
Andante sostenuto. The Piano Concerto No. 2 was composed in seventeen days in the spring of 1868. Saint-Saens arranged for a concert for Anton Rubenstein, the Russian pianist and conductor, in Paris, and wrote this work for that occasion. The movement begins with a piano solo playing a long improvisational introduction in the style of a Bach fantasia. After the orchestra enters, the restless and melancholy first theme is played, again by the piano solo. A brief second theme appears, followed by a middle section of increasing degrees of animato. There is a recapitulation of the main theme, played fortissimo, after which there is a long ad libitum cadenza by the soloist. The Bach-like opening motif returns in the coda.
Born on October 9, 1835 in Paris Died on December 16, 1921 in Algiers Camille Saint-Saens showed musical aptitude as a child almost comparable with that of Mozart. He began piano lessons when he was two-and-a-half years old, composed music when he was three years of age, and studied with a composition teacher by the time he was seven.
At age ten he performed a recital which included Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 3, Mozart’s Piano Concerto in B-flat, K. 460, along with other works by Bach, Handel and Hummel. When he was thirteen he entered the Paris Conservatory where he studied organ and composition.
By his early twenties he had significant success as a composer which won him the admiration of his contemporaries, such as Berlioz and Rossini. He had a highly successful career as an organist and composer. As a composer Saint-Saens wrote in virtually all genres including opera, symphony, concerto, choral music, piano and chamber music.
He was a traditionalist and is probably best remembered for his symphonic poem, Danse Macabre, the opera Samson and Delilah, and the Carnival of the Animals.
Program notes by Dr. John Green
|
|
Grand Prize Winners from earlier seasons
|
%203in.jpg)
In 2006 she won 2nd place in the Dallas Symphonic
Festival Intermediate Sonata Competition and was a Grand Prize winner in
the Texas A & M Piano Festival in Commerce. 
Beethoven’s
First Symphony was presented in its world premiere at the Hofburg
Theater in Vienna on April 2, 1880 when he was 29 years old. In various
style characteristics it drew upon established 18th century
patterns as evidenced in the classical symphonies of Haydn and Mozart.
At the same time it broke away from the traditional as Beethoven
approached what he considered a supreme task: the building of a
symphonic structure. The conservatives among his contemporaries reacted
almost as if it was a personal affront and such points of concern can be
found throughout the symphony.
Maurice
Ravel was born in the Basque region of France but grew up in Paris. He
entered the Paris Conservatoire in 1889. By 1895 he had already
developed a personal style of composition, but his unconventional
harmonies offended academic ears in spite of the classical basis of his
work. He failed five times to win the Prix de Rome (1900-05) and left
the Conservatoire to continue his life as a freelance musician.
Rossini’s
contribution to the development of opera was immense – indeed, he
dominated the world of opera for the first half of the nineteenth
century. Technically, he extended the range of both instrumental
textures and lyric ornamentation, and he introduced the “Rossini
crescendo”, where the same passage is repeated again and again, each
time with more instruments joining in. The effect created is of
mounting excitement. 
Both
of Rossini’s parents were musicians. His father was a talented trumpet
and horn player and his mother was an artistic singer who supplemented
the family income by singing opera roles. As a result Rossini was
taught by his parents to play the horn and to sing. He made his stage
debut in an opera at age seven in Bologna where his family lived. By
age 15 he was seriously studying music and wrote his first symphony at
age seventeen.
Saint-Saens’
long career reached well into the 20th century – he was born only two
years after Brahms and he died at the age of 86 in 1921. During the
last quarter of the 19th century he was a leading figure in the
advancement of the “new” French music. However, with the advent of the
20th century changes in musical expression he became the spokesman for
conservatism, and he left the progressive French field to Debussy.
Still, during the second half of the 19th century he was one of the most
influential and prolific composers in Europe.
