Trio                                                                                                                       Aram Khachaturian
     Andante con dolore
     Allegretto
     Moderato - Presto

Hommage à Henri Rousseau                                                                                          Daniel Foley
     Joyeux farceurs
     Le rêve
     Un soir de carnaval
     Clémence

                                                                  Intermission

Dream Tracks                                                                                                          Peter Sculthorpe

Trio Op. 97                                                                                                                           Hans Gál
     Moderato assai
     Andantino capriccioso
     Tema con varazioni

Aram Khachaturian (1903-1978) was a pillar of the Soviet musical establishment, epitomising that régime’s ideals of art accessible to all and the integration of national minorities into the Soviet whole. Though often assumed to represent the nation and music of Armenia, he was in fact Armenian only by ancestry; he was born in Georgia and lived in Moscow from his teenage years, and his identification as an Armenian composer was imposed by the Stalinist government. 

Folk music of the Caucasus, the Ukraine and Uzbekistan provides much of the material for Khachaturian’s work, lending it its loose, rhapsodic structure, languid melodies, vital rhythms and colourful tonal effects.  One particular inspiration was provided by the ashugs, wandering Azerbaijani folk musicians whose art of improvising ballads remains popular today. 

The Trio dates from early in Khachaturian’s career, in 1932, when he was still a student at the Moscow Conservatory.  It caught the attention of Prokofiev, and was the first of Khachaturian’s works to be played outside the Soviet Union.  The youth of the composer is displayed not in any lack of technique or assurance of instrumental writing, but rather in an inventive, organically evolving form and an overall freshness and vitality. 

The first movement is a slow, melismatic meditation, reminiscent of Scheherazade.  The second movement begins as a scherzo but unexpectedly changes into a gentle folksong, leading into an ecstatic middle section which is the energetic climax of the piece.  The third movement is an extended dance with several moods; its two musical subjects also appear in the Uzbek Dance Tune from Khachaturian’s Dance Suite for orchestra.  At times this movement displays a startlingly “pop” or “new age” flavour. 

Daniel Foley (born 1952) is one of Canada’s most prolific and often performed composers.  A long-time associate of the Canadian Music Centre, he has composed three symphonies and many other orchestral, chamber and solo works which have been played and recorded across Canada.  In 1999 he was awarded the Jan Vermulst Prize for Composition in the Netherlands.  He holds a Master of Arts (Music) degree from the University of Toronto.

Hommage à Henri Rousseau (1999) was commissioned by the Riverdale Ensemble.  It is one of a series of chamber works inspired by artists (the others to date being Klee, Kandinsky, Mondrian and Monet).  Henri Rousseau (1844-1910), nicknamed "Le douanier" because of his job as a toll collector, was the French pioneer of naïve art whose outwardly primitive technique, incongruous subject matter and awkward public manner aroused howls of derisive laughter in the contemporary art establishment.  The work incorporates a variety of styles- Baroque music, an Indian raga, folk tunes, even a touch of barrelhouse blues- to depict the images conjured up by Rousseau’s imagination.

Joyeux farceurs (Merry Pranksters, or maybe, in honour of Thanksgiving, Happy Stuffers!), painted in 1906, is one of Rousseau’s fantastical and often hilarious “jungle paintings”.  It depicts an incongruously sophisticated family of monkeys, equipped with the latest conveniences of milk bottles and back scratchers, in a lush tropical setting.  Rousseau encouraged the myth that he had explored the jungles of the New World while stationed in Mexico with the French Army; in fact he never ventured outside France, and the exotic plants portrayed in his late paintings were the fruits of his visits to the Jardin des plantes in Paris.

Le rêve (The Dream), another jungle painting, was exhibited shortly before Rousseau's death in 1910.  A nude woman reclines on a plush sofa amid a dense jungle populated by lions, an elephant, serpents and a shadowy figure playing a woodwind instrument.  The mystery and sensuality of the picture are reflected in the casting of the movement as an alapana, the hypnotic, rhythmically free introduction to a raga, accentuated by the use of the bass clarinet.

Un soir de carnaval (Carnival Evening) is the painting with which Rousseau made his official debut at the Salon des Indépendants in 1886.  A couple dressed as harlequins is dwarfed by the leafless trees of an eerie winter landscape and the moonlit sky that looms above them. The movement is based largely on an arrangement of La Folia, which was originally a Portuguese carnival dance. 

Clémence is based not on a painting but on a musical theme by Rousseau.  Rousseau adored his first wife, Clémence Boitard, who died of tuberculosis in 1888 at the age of 37.  Long after her death he maintained that her spirit guided his hand while he painted.  Along with his art, Rousseau wrote poetry and plays, taught lessons in elocution, music, painting and singing, and composed and performed on both the violin and the clarinet. The recitals he held at his home for his students and friends invariably included this waltz, Clémence, which he composed in 1885.

The paintings (sorry, only copies, not the originals!) inspiring the first three movements of the suite will be displayed at the concert.

Peter Sculthorpe (born 1929) is universally cited as Australia’s best-known composer.  Born in Tasmania, he studied in Melbourne and Oxford, and has spent the bulk of his life in his native country, apart from teaching stints in Britain and the U.S.A.  His biography reads like a catalogue of awards from academia and the music industry, attesting both to the quality of his music and to its compatibility with public tastes.

The aesthetic and much of the material of Sculthorpe’s music is rooted in the people and geography of Australia, with the culture and music of Asia- particularly Japan and Indonesia- also having an influence.  Of Dream Tracks (composed in 1992), Sculthorpe writes:

“Since 1988 I have written a series of works inspired by Kakadu National Park, in the north of Australia.  Some of these works have melodic material in common, the contours of each line usually being transformed in some way, both within pieces and in successive pieces.  I have come to regard these melodies as ‘songlines’ or ‘dreaming tracks’.  These are names used to describe the labyrinth of invisible pathways that, according to Aboriginal belief, are created by the totemic ancestors of all species as they sing the world into existence.

“Dream Tracks, then, sets out to summon up the spirit of a northern Australian landscape.  The work is in four sections:  Lontano, Molto sostenuto, Lontano, Estatico.  The first section takes as its point of departure the contours of a Torres Strait island children’s song.  This serves as an introduction to the second section, which is based upon an Arnhem Land chant, ‘Djilile’, or ‘whistling duck on a billabong’.  The third section is an extension of the first, its melodic contours also appearing in the fourth section.  In this final section, however, Djilile is ever-present, both in a much-transformed guise and in its original form.”

If ever a composer deserved to be called inexplicably neglected, it would have to be Hans Gál (1890-1987).  The composer of a large body of music in many genres (around 120 published works, plus many unpublished), finely crafted, intellectually satisfying and completely accessible to traditional ears, he is little known to the listening public.

Born into a Hungarian-Jewish family living in Vienna, Gál studied there under Eusebius Mandyczewski and became established as a teacher and opera composer, first in Vienna and later in Mainz.  The coming of the Nazis led to his dismissal, the banning of his music and subsequently his exile.  After a period in England which included a stint in an alien internment camp, he eventually settled in Edinburgh and lived there for the rest of his life, working as a lecturer, conductor and composer; he was one of the founders of the Edinburgh Festival.

Gál’s music is so firmly grounded in the classical Germanic tradition that it might seem familiar even when it is not; however, although affinities with other composers can be detected in his work, it would not be correct to say that he imitated anyone.  He remained true to a musical language established in the 1920s, while the musical world around him underwent several generations of upheaval.  This anachronistic attitude possibly accounts in part for the public neglect of his work. 

Any information that one might wish for concerning the life and works of Hans Gál is available on a website maintained by his grandson Simon Fox. 

The Trio Op. 97 was composed in 1950, though not published until 1971.  The three movements- the first in sonata form, the second a caprice with lyrical interludes, and the third a theme and variations- are firmly classical in architecture, showing a fine balance between traditional technique and innovation in detail.  Gál’s mastery of complex but transparent polyphonic textures, melodic inventiveness and accessibility, extended chromatic harmony and formal structures, accompanied by restrained lyricism, is displayed to the full.

The Gál, the Foley and the Khachaturian are all featured on the Riverdale Ensemble’s debut recording, Foliage.

We gratefully acknowledge the assistance of Aster's Music House in presenting this concert.