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Category: LIGHT CONCERT MUSIC Composer: P.I. Tchaikovsky Arranger: Philip Littlemore
Duration : 7.20
Great "Finisher".
March Slav was composed in 1876 at the request of Nicolai Rubenstein (who had recently spurned Tchaikovsky’s first piano concerto, and might have wanted to return to favour with the composer). Tchaikovsky loved Russian folk music—looking to it for inspiration throughout his career—and he makes considerable use of it here. From the opening theme to the final glorious statement of the Czarist national anthem, the march draws on the music of his motherland. It was first performed in a charity concert to support a war effort in the Balkans. He composed and fully scored the march in the short time of just 5 days. At the first performance its impact was such that it had to be encored in full, receiving a tumultuous reception – twice!
Category: LIGHT CONCERT MUSIC Composer: P.I. Tschaikovsky Arranger: Nicholas Childs
'Marche Slave' Duration: 7:00
Programme Notes Marche Slave is not a march at all but an elaborate concert piece; a symphonic tone poem on the subject of the military alliance between Russia and Serbia. The work includes folk songs from both countries.
Serbian folk tunes constitute the principal thematic material in the piece, with Russian airs introduced for symbolic support. It is interesting that Tchaikovsky quoted God Save the Tsar in several ceremonial works. In addition to this one, it was most famously used in his 7812 Overture, written four years after Marche Slave.
Russia and Turkey were at war intermittently for almost 200 years during which time the Czarist Empire slowly drove the Ottoman Turks back from its southern borders. In 1876 Serbia declared war on Turkey, and Russia joined the conflict in 1811.
A concert for the benefit of the Serbian wounded and the Red Cross was planned for November 17th 1876 in Moscow. Tchaikovsky, was asked to write something for the occasion, and he completed Marche Slave on October ]71h that year. The first performance took place six weeks later in Moscow, with Nikolai Rubinstein conducting. Tchaikovsky referred to Marche Slave as his “Russo-Serbian March”. The work evoked tremendous patriotic enthusiasm when it was first performed and today still touches the deepest parts of the soul for the majority of its audience.
Category: LIGHT CONCERT MUSIC Composer: Hector Berlioz Arranger: Philip Littlemore
The March to the Scaffold is the fourth of five movements from Hector Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique. The symphony tells the story of a troubled young man and his quest to find his true love. This true love is depicted in the music by a melody known as a idée fixe (fixed idea) and appears in every movement. The fourth movement takes on a nightmarish character as having taken opium, the young man dreams that he has killed his true love and is about to be executed for his crime. The music is an unrelenting forced march to the scaffold. The idée fixe appears only once in this movement, as a sudden reminiscence just before the guillotine strikes the young man’s head before the movement comes to an end with a perversely joyous conclusion.
Categories: LIGHT CONCERT MUSIC, Howard Snell Music Composer: Hector Berlioz Arranger: Howard Snell
from Symphony Fantastique - one of the most dramatic marches ever written.
Howard Snell writes: You can view the Solo Cornet part as a PDF image of this work on your computer, by clicking on the "MORE DETAILS" button on the right - this will the PDF image for you to sample.
The journey to the scaffold of a man who has murdered his lover is the image behind the 4th movement from the Symphonie Fantastique (subtitled An Episode in the Life of an Artist). Berlioz' imagination, widely regarded as near insane during his lifetime, operated on the edge of musical possibility : his scoring for the orchestra, and particularly his use of harmony in non-standard ways was regarded as ignorant and primitive by non other than Mendelssohn. These factors are very clearly heard at work in this movement. Berlioz first made his reputation in England where his use of very large orchestral and choral forces gained an enthusiastic audience. The modern revival of interest in his music recommenced in England during the 1960s.
Category: LIGHT CONCERT MUSIC Composer: Hector Berlioz Material: Robert Childs
Symphonie Fantastique, the first of Berlioz's major works, was composed in 1830 when he was 26. March to the Scaffold, the fourth movement of this major work is music borrowed from Les Francs Juges, an abandoned opera started in 1826, originally titled March of the Guards. The ending of the original was changed to accommodate the appearance of the idée fixe. This tune itself was used in an earlier work, the cantata Herminei of 1828. March to the Scaffold depicts a young man in despair, having been shunned by the woman he loves. He poisons himself with opium. The narcotic too weak to take his life, plunges him into a long sleep. He has a series of vivid dreams and nightmares always involving images of his beloved. The hero dreams that he has killed her and has been sentenced to death. He sees himself being marched through the crowded streets amidst wild jeers from excited onlookers until he finally reaches the scaffold.
Just before the guillotine descends to cut off his head, he imagines he sees his beloved in the crowd. Her tune is played by the soprano cornet and is the last thing seen or heard before the guillotine falls. He is killed, and the movement comes to a dramatic close.
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