I. Poco Allegro - Nonet for winds and strings by Bohuslav Martinů скачать в хорошем качестве

I. Poco Allegro - Nonet for winds and strings by Bohuslav Martinů

Nonet for winds and strings by Bohuslav Martinů (1890-1959) I. Poco Allegro II. Andante III. Allegretto Elizabeth Rowe, flute John Ferrillo, oboe William. R. Hudgins, clarinet Richard Svoboda, bassoon Richard Sebring, horn Haldan Martinson, violin Steven Ansell, viola Blaise Dejardin, cello Edwin Baker, double bass Bohuslav Martinů was born when his great Czech predecessor Dvořák was at the height of his powers, and before Leoš Janáček had really come into his own. Their influence was immensely important for Martinů, whose musical talent was recognized early, but whose isolated upbringing and apparent lack of flair for traditional scholarship led to slow progress as a composer. Following a stint as a violinist with the Czech Philharmonic, he expanded his scope, moving in 1923 to Paris, where he studied with the somewhat progressive Albert Roussel. He was by that time, and would remain, extraordinarily prolific in all genres, including experimental forms suggested by Dada and surrealist explorations of the era under the influence of visual art and such composers as Satie and Milhaud. Primarily, though, he aimed for crispness and clarity in the music itself, fitting in well with the prevailing neoclassical style. In the 1930s he modeled many of his works on older forms, including the concerto grosso and the madrigal. Ultimately his style was a blend of that language with the pungent harmonic and melodic contours, as well as the flexible rhythmic gestures, of the folk music of his beloved Bohemia. For most of his time in Paris, Martinů was able to travel freely between there and Prague and his hometown of Polička, but after the start of World War II he found himself blacklisted by the Nazis for attempting to aid his fellow Czechs. In 1941 he and his wife Charlotte made a difficult emigration to the United States, where he found champions of his music including Boston Symphony Orchestra conductor Serge Koussevitzky. (The BSO had first played his music in 1927.) In addition to commissioning the composer's Symphony No. 1 (1942), Koussevitzky provided a teaching position for the composer at the Berkshire Music Center. Ultimately the orchestra, during Koussevitzky's tenure and that of his successor Charles Munch, premiered nine of Martinů's orchestral works. The composer longed to return to his homeland after the war and accepted a position at the new Prague Conservatory, but recuperation from an injury, and then the worsening political situation in Czechoslovakia under the Soviet influence, derailed his hopes. He spent most of the rest of his life shuttling between the U.S. and Europe, with relatively brief stays in France, Italy, and Switzerland, where he died in 1959. Although comfortable in every medium and particularly drawn to works for the stage, Martinů professed a special fondness for composing chamber music, composing nearly a hundred works for small instrumental combinations, including seven string quartets. There is an incomplete earlier Nonet, dating from 1925, for winds, strings, and piano; the present Nonet, for wind quintet and single strings, was one of the composer's last works. Martinů composed it for a group called Czech Nonet on the occasion of their 35th anniversary. The delightful Nonet is in three movements, lasting about twelve minutes. Sharp motifs and short, asymmetrical phrases are akin to Stravinsky's music in, say, L'Histoire du soldat, but Martinů's approach to large-scale form here is fairly traditional. His first movement approaches sonata form, with the herky-jerky first idea-clarinet accompanied by staccato strings-ceding to a contrastingly lyrical chorale in the woodwinds. There is even a verbatim return to the opening after a brief developmental episode. The cohesive mosaic image formed by the interaction of small melodic fragments is characteristic of this composer. The middle movement is an atmospheric Andante, featuring chromatic, singing melodic lines over a backdrop of quicker fragments. The finale, Allegretto, begins with a violin melody hinting strongly at Central European folk music, with an offbeat viola pushing it still further in that direction. Rapidly changing meters lend it a dancing feel. The movement changes character quickly, each brief episode growing out of something suggested by the prior one, until at last we return to the finale's beginning. A chorale-like coda provides a warm conclusion. January 19, 2020