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The
Dallas Morning News Symphony Series
Stars of the Future
John-Henry Crawford
cello
Kyle
Orth
piano
 
L to R: Crawford, Orth.
The
Grand Prize Winners of The Young Artists' Competition
Friday,
February 23,
2007 at 8:00pm
at Lakeland Baptist Church
(Directions)
Adults $20, Senior $ (60+) $18,
student $8
Special Group Rates - click here
The concert is sponsored
by generous donations by
Duane and Judi Johnson
and
Bill and Pat Leggett
Nicolai: Merry Wives of Windsor Overture
Elgar: Cello Concerto in E-Minor, fourth
movement
Strauss: Artists Life Waltz
Liszt: Totentanz
Competition Judges:
Maestro Adron Ming and
Dr. Heejung Kang
Kyle Orth
Kyle
Orth, sixteen, was born in Fountain Valley, California and now lives in
Richardson. He has been studying the piano since he arrived here in
Texas when he was eight. He is home schooled and in 10th
grade. Each day, he puts in about three hours of practice.
Last year, he won the Grand Prize at the Collin
County Young Artist Competition and performed with the Plano Symphony
Orchestra. Earlier this year, Kyle won first prize st at the
Lennox International Young Artists Competition and, as a result, will be
performing with the Richardson Symphony, a week after playing with the Lewisville Lake
Symphony.
Kyle has studied under Justin Proffitt and been
coached by Alex McDonald. He is presently studying with Marcy
McDonald. His college plans are undecided but he is considering music
as a piano major. As well as being a voracious reader he composes music
and enjoys English dancing.
John-Henry Crawford
 John-Henry
won his first concerto competition on his 13th birthday in
January 2006 and subsequently performed the Saint-Saens Cello Concerto
with the Monroe Symphony Orchestra in their subscription series. Also
during the same month he won the Rapides Young Artist Competition and
performed the Saint-Saens with the Rapides Symphony (Alexandria) on
their subscription series.
This year, as a result of winning competitions he
will play with the Louisiana Philharmonic in New Orleans twice in the
month of April and with the Lewisville Lake Symphony in Texas in
February.
John-Henry Crawford started cello at age five. His
Louisiana teacher is Kristina Vaska-Haas, and he has recently been
traveling to Dallas, Texas to study with Andres Diaz, concert cellist
and SMU professor.
Last summer, he
attended Meadowmount School of Music in New York under teacher Hans
Jensen.
He performs in the Southfield School Chamber
Orchestra and was principal cellist of the Ark-La-Tex Youth Orchestra.
John-Henry is from a musical family; his Austrian grandfather (Robert
Popper), his uncle, and his brother are all cellists and his mother is a
violinist.
John-Henry performs on his grandfather Popper’s 176
year old Central European cello. In addition to playing the cello, he is
on his school fencing team, basketball team, and math counts team. He
also enjoys biking, paint-balling, lacrosse, and performing magic
tricks.
Overture to “The Merry
Wives of Windsor”
Otto Nicolai
Otto Nicolai
spent decisive years of apprenticeship in Rome and Vienna. His overture
reflects these experiences in an attractive blend of German guild-craft
with Italian tunefulness. This theater music is not “great” in the sense
of classical achievement. But this delightful overture is what would be
called in Nicolai’s native land “Kapellmeister Musik” at its very best:
it is the music of a conductor-composer who knew his orchestra
intimately and used each instrument with discriminating effect.
The overture unfolds with a tranquil, diatonic theme rising out of the F
major triad. This lyric mood is followed by a humorous one which, in
turn, leads to the burlesque. The orchestral climax tells of the opera’s
familiar buffo scene in the Windsor forest.
 Otto Nicolai
Born on June 9, 1810 in Konigsberg
Died on May 11, 1849 in Berlin
Otto Nicolai has come to be viewed by many as a
one-work composer. The Merry Wives of Windsor is regarded as his
greatest work, yet others are worth hearing and he would have produced
more if his life had not ended prematurely. Nicolai was artistically
bound by a certain perfectionism and caution that hampered his
productivity. He is remembered for his high performance standards and
for having founded the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.
Nicolai was raised by his father, a composer of
lesser rank. He began showing talent early on, but became resentful of
his father’s attempts to benefit from making him a child prodigy. At 16
he lit out on his own as a traveling pianist and, after many
difficulties, made his way to Berlin. After several years of study he
began teaching music, but he struggled in poverty. His compositions
gradually became accepted and performed. In 1833 he became organist at
the Prussian Embassy in Rome. He returned to Vienna in 1841 as a
conductor at the Hofoper. In 1848 he became Kapellmeister at the Berlin
Opera. Nicolai completed the Merry Wives and it was premiered with
success, and has held the stage ever since as one of the German operas
famous comic gems.
Concerto for Cello
in E minor, Opus 85
Edward Elgar
IV. Allegro
The Cello Concerto is Elgar’s last important work. He wrote this
concerto one year before the death of his wife. Carolyn Alice Elgar had
been the composer’s devoted helpmate. She secured the proper environment
for his productivity, watched over his health, and directed all of his
decisions. After the death of Lady Elgar, the composer lived for fifteen
more years, but apparently lost his inspiration to create.
In the fourth movement, which is being performed this evening, the cello
states the principal theme, followed by a brief cadenza. A rapid
dialogue occurs between the soloist and the orchestra. The main theme is
then presented by the orchestra in a variety of colors. The second
subject appears in the cello. Suddenly, the rondo is halted and the
cello is heard in a meditative mood to a gentle accompaniment. The work
closes with a lively resumption of the rondo theme.
 Sir
Edward Elgar
Born on June 2, 1857 in
Broadheath
Died on February 23, 1934 in
Worcestershire
Elgar’s father had a music shop in Worcester and
tuned pianos. The young Elgar, therefore, had the advantage of growing
up in a thoroughly practical musical atmosphere. He taught himself to
play a wide variety of instruments, and it is a remarkable fact that he
was largely self-taught as a composer. Consequently, his long struggle
to establish himself as a pre-eminent composer of international repute
was hard and often bitter.
Elgar’s reputation as a composer started to spread in
the late 1890’s in response to his Imperial March and the
Enigma Variations. These works showed that Elgar, by that time, had
surpassed the other leading English composers of his day. His Pomp
and Circumstance Marches followed in 1901 and it was clear to all
that he had “arrived”. He is also remembered for the two symphonies he
wrote as well as the Violin Concerto in B minor. His final great
period emerged in 1918 and 1919 when he produced three successful
chamber works and his notable Cello Concerto in E minor.
Kunstlerleben
(Artists’ Life)
Opus 316
Johann Strauss II
Kunstlerleben is a waltz written by Johann Strauss II in 1867, following
closely on the success of “The Blue Danube” waltz. Austria was severely
shaken the year before by the crushing defeat the Austrian army suffered
in the Battle of Koniggratz. Many of the year’s festivities and balls
were cancelled as the prevalent depressing mood affected most of
Vienna’s populace. Strauss’ near impossible task of inspiring a joie de
vivre into the Vienna Carnival Fasching of 1867 was met with great
aplomb by all three Strauss brothers as their works displayed no signs
of dying inspiration, and in turn introduced to the Viennese how their
creative spirit defied the troubled spirit of the times.
The introduction of the waltz begins with a plaintive horn solo and a
quietly dramatic string passage in A minor. A pensive waltz melody
in A major is introduced, before being cut short by two loud and fierce
chords. The first waltz section is then played, with a high-spirited
melody and a robust accompanying waltz passage.
The second
waltz section is a melancholic tune in two parts, with the same dramatic
chords as heard in the Introduction before a more upbeat melody heralds
the entry of the happier third section. The plaintive mood of the waltz
continues in the fifth section before the Minor-sounding Coda appears.
The first waltz melody makes another quiet entrance before the waltz is
brought to its triumphant close, with a strong chord and flourish,
underlined by a snare drum roll.
 Johann Strauss II
Born on October 25,
1825 in Vienna
Died on June 3, 1899 in Vienna
Johann Strauss II was the oldest son of
composer-violinist Johann Strauss. The father was adamantly opposed to
his son pursuing a career in music and intended for him to enter the
banking profession. However, Johann II displayed musical gifts at an
early age. He began composing at six years of age, and his mother
arranged for him to secretly study violin. When his father abandoned
the family, young Johann pursued additional formal musical training. In
1844, at 19 years of age, he formed his own orchestra and made his
professional debut as concertmaster and conductor.
Johann II enjoyed tremendous success as both composer
and conductor, touring Europe, Russia, and the United States. He
brought the Viennese waltz to its highest form with his gifts for
melody, interesting harmonic structure, and clever orchestrations. He
also became known as a composer of operettas, with his two most
successful being Die Fledermaus and Zigeunerbaron. Those
works took operetta in a new direction, evolving into a style that was
purely Viennese. Johann II became the most prominent of the Strauss
family members, and he died a wealthy and famous man in 1899.
“Todtentanz” for Piano
and Orchestra
Franz Liszt
In Pisa,
Italy Franz Liszt saw the famous fresco called “The Triumph of Death”
which art historians attribute to Lorenzetti. The scene depicted by the
painting is between heaven and hell. Angels welcome the good and the
praying ones to Paradise. Devils condemn the bad ones to a flaming
mountain. The painter portrayed death as a terrifying creature – as a
kind of female vampire. Corpses surround the beast in a frightening
circle.
Liszt transferred “The Triumph of Death” from a visual into an aural
representation in the form of a piano concerto. Its structure is that of
a theme and variations. The theme is the Dies Irae, an ancient
ecclesiastical melody. The variations represent the different dances of
death. Both the orchestra and the piano share in their clangorous
performance. The romantic composer filled his tonal canvas with a
veritable nightmare of demons and monsters, intended to be recognized as
the musical counterpart of the medieval painting in Pisa.
Franz Liszt
Born on October 22, 1811 in
Raiding, Hungary
Died on July 31, 1886 in
Bayreuth, Germany
Franz Liszt was a Hungarian virtuoso pianist and
composer of the Romantic period. He was a renowned performer throughout
Europe during the 19th Century, noted especially for his
showmanship and great skill with the keyboard. Today, he is considered
to be one of the greatest pianists in history, despite the fact that no
recordings of his playing exist. Liszt is frequently credited with
re-defining piano playing itself, and his influence is still visible
today. He also contributed greatly towards the Romantic idiom in
general, and he is credited with the invention of the symphonic poem.
Liszt studied and played at Vienna and Paris and for
most of his early adulthood toured throughout Europe giving concerts.
He is credited with inventing the modern piano recital, where his
virtuosity won him approval by composers and performers alike. Many of
his piano compositions have entered the standard repertoire, including
the two Hungarian Rhapsodies and two piano concertos. Many of his piano
compositions are among the most technically challenging in the
repertoire. Liszt was himself a composer of lieder and choral music and
of symphonic poems and other orchestral works.
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