BÉLA BARTÓK (1881-1945)
The Wooden Prince (1914-1917)
When Béla Bartók read Béla Balázs’s story of The Wooden Prince in a literary magazine, he was immediately drawn to it as a potential ballet scenario. The adult fairy tale revolves around a Princess, a Prince, a Forest Fairy, and a puppet version of the Prince (i.e., the Wooden Prince) with whom the Princess has a temporary infatuation. And since the course of true love never did run smooth, the Forest Fairy places obstacles along that course. As the Prince pursues the Princess, a darkly menacing forest and the waves of a stream rage against him. Unable to cross the stream, he creates a puppet replica of himself out of his staff, cloak, locks of hair, and his crown. Apparently persuaded by the illusion, the Princess rejects the flesh-and-blood Prince. The Forest Fairy brings the Wooden Prince to life, and he dances with the Princess. When she realizes her mistake, she tries to win the real Prince through a seductive dance, but he will have nothing to do with her. When she tears her clothes and hair he is finally moved by her despair. Nature is restored to its former state when the Forest Fairy withdraws, and Prince and Princess no doubt live happily ever after. Leaving psychology aside, Bartók depicts the Prince and the puppet with two versions of the same music: the Prince’s is lyrical and the puppet’s is grotesque. Reflecting her various emotional states, the Princess’s music runs the gamut from cruel to kind to sensuous. Highlights of the score include rumblings in the depths of the orchestra presaging the dark forces of nature, the ominous sounds of the forest, the scintillating, gleaming flute and harp sonorities of the waters, and the love music inspired by the beautiful Hungarian folk song “Fly, Peacock, Fly.”

FRÉDÉRIC CHOPIN (1810-1849)
Piano Concerto No. 2 in F Minor (1829)
Frederic Chopin displayed a quiet power in his playing—so quiet, in fact, that with the exception of his two piano concertos and just a handful of other orchestral compositions, his entire output was for solo piano. So it is no surprise that when we think of Chopin, we think of the many intimate piano genres he seemed to “own”: études, nocturnes, impromptus, mazurkas, waltzes, and polonaises, ideal for the salons of Paris where Chopin preferred to perform. That intimacy also found its way into his two piano concertos, full of the musical poetry we associate with his works, and nowhere more beautifully expressed than in their ravishing slow movements. The Piano Concerto No. 2 was actually composed first but didn’t make it to the publisher until after the E Minor Concerto (composed about six months later but published first, and therefore called No. 1). It is the creation of the 19-year-old composer expressing his love for a fellow-Warsaw Conservatory student, the singer Konstancia Gladowska, who was unaware of his secret passion. He confessed to his friend Titus Woyciechowski: “I have—perhaps to my own misfortune—already found my ideal, whom I worship faithfully and sincerely. Six months have elapsed, and I haven’t yet exchanged a syllable with her of whom I dream every night—she who was in my mind when I composed the Adagio of my Concerto.” During the political strife that engulfed Poland in the late 1820s, Chopin left his family for Vienna and then for permanent exile to Paris, the acknowledged music capital of the time, to get a piece of the piano performance marketplace. But the world of the virtuoso showman (à la Liszt) wasn’t really for him, it turns out. He preferred quieter pursuits and venues, even though his two piano concertos were part of his tour repertoire. Much has been made of Chopin’s presumed lack of ability to write for orchestra, but these are misplaced expectations. He modeled his concerto not on those of Beethoven, but rather on the Romantic style of Field or Hummel, where the orchestra plays the role of accompanist. Though Chopin’s touch was very delicate, he had amazing expressive powers, and this concerto is in synch with that softer touch. Listen especially for the mazurka-infused finale and the Larghetto second movement (the particular inspiration of Konstancia), about which Liszt enthused: “a perfection almost ideal, its expression now radiant with light, now full of tender pathos.”

ANTONÍN DVORÁK (1841-1904)
Symphony No. 9, From the New World (1893)
At the invitation of the visionary Mrs. Jeanette Thurber, Antonín Dvorák (along with his wife and two of their six children) came to New York in 1892 to become head of the National Conservatory (located at east 17th Street and Irving Place), a school founded by her to encourage the development of American concert music. He composed his famous Ninth Symphony, nicknamed “From the New World” during his first year in America; the following year, the New York Philharmonic premièred Dvorák’s most beloved score at Carnegie Hall. A strong advocate of indigenous music as the inspiration for art music, he felt that America’s composers should look to their native land—not “the old country”—for inspiration he provided this comment about his Ninth Symphony: “Since I have been in this country I have been deeply interested in the national music of the Negroes and the Indians. The character, the very nature of a race, is contained in its national music. For that reason my attention was at once turned in the direction of these native melodies…It is this spirit which I have tried to reproduce in my new Symphony….I have not actually used any of the melodies. I have simply written original themes embodying the peculiarities of the music and, using these themes as subjects, have developed them with all the resources of modern rhythms, harmony, counterpoint and orchestral color.” His explanation notwithstanding, there is still plenty of the Old World in the ”New World” Symphony. As he remarked, the subtitle was intended to convey “impressions and greetings from the New World”… a sort of musical postcard from America. Filled with lovely melodies, bold calls from the horns, and an unforgettable theme that weaves its way throughout the symphony, the Ninth was also an expression of homesickness for his native Bohemia. The premiere was a smashing success, prompting Dvorák to write: “Carnegie Hall was crowded with the best people of New York, and the audience applauded so that, like a king, I had to take my bows repeatedly from the box in which I sat.” This symphony has entered popular culture, too, and many a man or woman on the street can hum the haunting “Goin’ Home” from the slow movement—always a star turn for the solo English horn. It made it into the movie Paradise Road, with Glenn Close organizing and leading a chorus of women prisoners of war in a Japanese POW camp in Sumatra in World War II. Having no instruments to play, their voices become the orchestra.

Marin Alsop was appointed the 12th music director of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, beginning with the 2007–08 season. She is the first woman to head a major American orchestra, mirroring her ongoing success in the United Kingdom as principal conductor of the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra since 2002. The first artist to win both Gramophone’s “Artist of the Year” award and the Royal Philharmonic Society’s conductor’s award in the same season, Ms. Alsop was named a MacArthur Fellow and won the Classical Brit Award for Best Female Artist that year — the first conductor to receive this prestigious American honor. She has also received the Royal Philharmonic Society’s BBC Radio 3 Listeners Award and European Women of Achievement Award.

Ms. Alsop is a regular guest conductor of the New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and Los Angeles Philharmonic. She is also one of the few conductors to appear every season with both the London Symphony and the London Philharmonic orchestras, and has appeared as a guest conductor with many other distinguished orchestras worldwide, including Amsterdam’s Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Zurich Tonhalle, Orchestre de Paris, Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, and Tokyo Philharmonic.

Highlights of Marin Alsop’s recording collaboration with Naxos include a Brahms symphony cycle with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and an ongoing series of Bournemouth Symphony CDs of music by Bartók, Bernstein, Orff, and several living American composers. One of her first projects as music director of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra will be a Dvořák symphonic cycle. Ms. Alsop can also be heard regularly as a commentator on NPR’s Weekend Edition segment “Marin on Music,” and on BBC’s Radio 3.

In 2006, Marin Alsop was the only classical musician invited to attend the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, alongside presidents, prime ministers, and CEOs of the world’s most powerful companies. She is a native of New York City, attended Yale University, and received her master’s degree from The Juilliard School. She last appeared with the New York Philharmonic in July 2006 at the Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival.

Pianist Rafał Blechacz was born on June 30, 1985, in Nakło nad Notecią, Poland. He began studying the piano at the age of five and completed his formal education in 2007 at the Feliks Nowowiejski Music Academy in Bydgoszcz, studying with Professor Katarzyna Popowa-Zydron. He won second prize at the Arthur Rubinstein Young Pianist Competition in Bydgoszcz in 2002 and at the Fifth International Young Pianist Competition in Hamamatsu, Japan, in 2003. In 2004 he garnered first prize at the Fourth International Piano Competition in Morocco. In 2005 Mr. Blechacz won first prize at the 15th International Frederic Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw; in special recognition of his achievement, the jury decided, for the first time in the competition’s history, not to award a second prize. He also won four special prizes, including the Polish Radio Award for best performance of the mazurkas, the Polish Chopin Society Award for best performance of the Polonaise, the Warsaw Philharmonic Award for best performance of a concerto, and the award founded by Krystian Zimerman for best sonata performance.

In 2006 Mr. Blechacz was invited to perform at Warsaw Philharmonic Hall; the Moscow Conservatory with the Mariinsky Orchestra under Valery Gergiev; the Tonhalle in Zurich, and the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. He has given a series of recitals in Japan, and appeared at the Ruhr, Verbier, and La Roque d’Antheron summer music festivals. In 2007 he appeared in Herkules Saal in Munich, Wigmore Hall in London, Auditorio Nacional in Madrid, and Palais des Beaux Arts in Brussels. In May 2006 he signed an exclusive contract with Deutsche Grammophon for three recordings. The first — the complete Chopin Preludes coupled with Two Nocturnes Op. 62 — was released in September 2007. It achieved gold status after one day, and subsequently went platinum.