FELIX MENDELSSOHN (1809-1847)
Overture to Ruy Blas (1839)
Composed on commission from the Leipzig Theatrical Pension Fund, Mendelssohn’s overture to Ruy Blas, introduces Victor Hugo’s play, set in 17th century Spain. Mendelssohn wasn’t keen on fulfilling this commission; he felt the play was “odious” and “beneath contempt.” He told funders that he didn’t have time to write it. When the folks at the Fund expressed their regret at not having given him enough time, Mendelssohn took that as a challenge and completed the assignment in a mere three days, just in the nick of time for the benefit performance. The plot involves the valet Ruy Blas whose master Don Salluste seeks revenge against the Spanish queen by entangling her in an affair with Ruy (disguised as a nobleman) and then blackmailing her. His plans go awry when Ruy becomes a popular court figure—rising to the post of prime minister. When Ruy is exposed by his cruel master, he murders him, and then takes poison. In his dying moments the queen forgives him. The overture evokes all the turbulence, romance, and plot twists of the play, opening with a solemn brass chorale—a reflection of the court perhaps—and then proceeds to the powerful main theme. There are plenty of hints at the melodrama of the story, but mercifully Mendelssohn omits a depiction of the bloody ending.

FELIX MENDELSSOHN (1809-1847)
Violin Concerto (1844)
In 1835, when Felix Mendelssohn was just 27 years old, he was appointed conductor of the famed Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra and hired Ferdinand David to be concertmaster. The two had been friends since their teens—a friendship that would continue throughout their lives. Mendelssohn started thinking about a violin concerto in 1838, and wrote to him, “I want to write a violin concerto next winter. One in E Minor is running through my head, and the beginning of it gives me no peace….” But it would be another six years before the concerto was completed, thanks to Ferdinand David’s encouragement, advice, and gentle pressure to get it done. David was the dedicatee and the soloist at the premiere. The work was a great success, and other performances soon followed. One was particularly memorable, as it launched the career of the then-14-year-old violin prodigy Joseph Joachim, a last-minute substitution for the indisposed Clara Schumann, originally scheduled to perform her husband’s piano concerto in Dresden. The genially-inspired work takes the concerto genre to realms far exceeding the many empty show-off pieces that were then a-dime-a-dozen, but are now forgotten. While soloists can certainly display their technical brilliance, the Mendelssohn concerto also calls upon them to interpret the emotional content of the gorgeous melodies. The work has been praised for its tight construction, such as the immediate entrance of the violin at the beginning, linking phrases between the movements, and placing the first cadenza in the middle, instead of at the end of the first movement. But audiences don’t need to understand the technical aspects of this popular score. It’s ultimately about the beauty of the sound. It was Joachim who summed it up best many years later: “The Germans have four violin concertos. The greatest, the one that makes fewest concessions, is Beethoven’s. The one by Brahms comes close to Beethoven’s in its seriousness. Max Bruch wrote the richest and most seductive of the four. But the dearest of them all, the heart’s jewel, is Mendelssohn’s.”

FELIX MENDELSSOHN (1809-1847)
Die Erste Walpurgisnacht (The First Walpurgis Night) , Op. 60 (1831; rev. 1842/43)
In 1799, Germany’s most revered poet, dramatist, and novelist, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) wrote the dramatic ballad “Die Erste Walpurgisnacht” and was seeking someone to set it to music. He first tapped his friend Karl Friedrich Zelter, who didn’t feel he was up to the task after reading the text. Zelter turned the task over to his student, one Felix Mendelssohn, who completed the assignment in 1831. The two men encountered each other when Mendelssohn was a mere 20, and the grand old man Goethe was 80. In subsequent correspondence between them about the project, Goethe explained that there was a deeper meaning to his ballad. “It is highly symbolic. For, in world history, it must occur again and again that something old, well-established, well-tried, and comforting is pushed aside, and, if not extirpated, cramped into the least possible space, by innovations that crop up. The intermediate period, where hate still can and does have its counter effect, is presented here pregnantly enough, and joyous, indestructible enthusiasm flames up once more in glory and truth.” After the secular cantata premiered at the Berlin Sing-Akademie in 1833, Mendelssohn felt it needed revision and undertook a recasting of it ten years later, the version performed today. Sadly, Goethe died before he could hear it. “Walpurgisnacht,” the night of April 30 to May 1, is a confluence of pagan and Christian elements: ancient German tradition has it that witches and devils gather that night on the Brocken Mountain, an inhospitable peak in the Harz Mountains (à la Mussorgsky’s Night on Bald Mountain); but April 30 is also the feast day of St. Walburga, a missionary to Germany, whose name was conflated with Waldborg, a heathen fertility goddess. The story of the ballad and the cantata revolves around the ancient spring rituals of German Druids and their followers, who, having been persecuted by fanatical Christians bent on exterminating them, flee in order to be free and safe to worship their nature gods and to celebrate the renewal of the light and of spring. On Walpurgis Night they decide to frighten away the “superstitious” plotters and proselytizers by turning their superstitions against them: they put on the disguises of devils and witches and all hell breaks loose to an unbelievable racket (created by the normally more restrained Mendelssohn with bass drum, cymbals, and shrill piping from the piccolo). After they have driven off the persecutors, the spring ritual can finally take place. The overture is in two parts: “Bad Weather” and “Transition to Spring,” and at the center of the cantata is a grand chorus sung by the guardians of the Druids. The romantic treatment of this subject is colorful and full of energy, with noise and racket enough to wake the dead during the witches’ scene; we’re pulled us into the tumult of this strange and fantastical night and then lead out into the glorious light of spring, expressed with a grand C Major chord. Hector Berlioz, who knew a thing or two about Witches’ Sabbaths, was in the audience for the premiere and declared it “a true masterpiece!”

KURT MASUR, conductor, born in 1927 in Brieg, Silesia
Kurt Masur was music director of the New York Philharmonic from 1991 to 2002, and now holds the title of Music Director Emeritus. During his tenure, the orchestra resumed its “Live from Lincoln Center” broadcasts. At one of them, he recalled that, as a young man, he had been very shy. “I had my very first concert at the age of 16. I hadn’t heard a symphony orchestra before, and I was so deeply impressed that I said I have to be a conductor. Even my family laughed at me because they thought this young guy who’s always stuttering in front of other people should be in front of 100 musicians and talk to them and lead them?! I can go in front of an orchestra. I can go in front of an audience. But if you see me walking through an audience at a reception or through a lot of people, I’m still shy.” His studies at the Music College of Leipzig were interrupted by World War II. Needing to earn a living after the war, he played string bass in a jazz combo while continuing his musical training. His first major conducting appointment was with the Dresden Philharmonic in 1955. Starting in 1970, Kurt Masur began his celebrated 26-year tenure as Kapellmeister of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, a position of profound historic importance, conducting nearly a thousand concerts, and more than 900 on tour. Today he is its laureate music director. He is also honorary music director for life of the Orchestre National de France and principal guest conductor of the Israel Philharmonic, also for life. In 2009, the film Adventures in Listening was released, following the maestro’s master classes around the world and interweaves his teachings and personal life experiences into a comprehensive emotional portrait of one of the most respected music conductors of our time.

“Kurt Masur has bequeathed the Philharmonic a roseate, golden sound, a downy loft to the rhythm, and a spacious sense of breath.” Newsday

Find additional upcoming performances with Kurt Masur

Anne-Sophie Mutter recently appeared as a guest artist with the Vienna Philharmonic, Amsterdam’s Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, The Philadelphia Orchestra, Leipzig Gewandhaus, Berlin Philharmonic, London Symphony Orchestra, Munich Philharmonic, Orchestre National de France, and Oslo Philharmonic. She has also served both as soloist and leader with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and the Munich Chamber Orchestra, and in 2008 served as soloist and leader with both the Trondheim Soloists and Camerata Salzburg. In April 2008 she toured the U.S. in recital with pianist Lambert Orkis performing Brahms violin sonatas. Ms. Mutter appears in Europe with the Mutter- Bashmet-Harrell Trio performing the Beethoven piano trios and recording the Mendelssohn Piano Trio to be coupled with the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto for the composer’s 200th birthday in 2009. She also tours with the Mutter-Previn-Harrell Trio. Ms. Mutter’s worldwide projects have included the Beethoven sonatas (1998); Back to the Future, a retrospective of 20th-century violin works, and a three-concert cycle of Mozart sonatas. She has appeared in Carnegie Hall performing all the Mozart concertos and a cycle of Mozart sonatas, and Deutsche Grammophon has released her recording and DVD of Mozart sonatas and concertos.

Mezzo-soprano Christine Knorren was born in Germany, and studied at the Hamburg Conservatory of Music. After receiving her diploma in lied and oratorio, she became a member of the International Opera Studio of the Zürich Opera House, where she made her debut in Verdi’s Rigoletto, followed by performances in Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia and the comic opera, Der Wildschütz, by Lortzing. She subsequently performed the roles of Orfeo in Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice and Oktavian in R. Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier in her hometown of Aachen; Preziosilla in Verdi’s La forza del destino in Spain; Azucena in Verdi’s Il trovatore in Denmark; and Fenena in Verdi’s Nabucco in Switzerland. Ms. Knorren won the Mozart Prize in Hamburg and the International J. Aragall Competition in Spain. In addition to opera, she also performs sacred music and gives song recitals. Future engagements include a recording of R. Koering’s Penthesilea in Montpellier; Rossini’s Stabat Mater in Cologne; Il trovatore in Cesena; Handel’s Giustino in Verona; Mahler’s Symphony No. 2, Resurrection, at the Cairo Opera House; and Debussy’s Le Martyre de Saint-Sébastien in Paris conducted by Daniele Gatti.

Tenor Jorma Silvasti portrayed Laca in Janácĕk’s Jenůfa at The Metropolitan Opera and Shouysky in Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov at the Vienna Staatsoper in the 2007 season. He will begin his 2009–10 season performing the role of Shouysky in Boris Godunov at Vienna Staatsoper. He will subsequently appear with Finnish National Opera as Tamino in Mozart’s The Magic Flute; Laca in Jenůfa in Vienna and at the Bayerische Staatsoper, and Madrid Teatro Real. Also in 2009, he will perform Mendelssohn’s Elijah in Leipzig, and the role of Lensky in Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin in Helsinki. In 2011 he will appear as Boris in Janacek’s Káta Kabonová at the Opéra de Paris, and Loge in Wagner’s Das Rheingold with Finnish National Opera. Mr. Silvasti made his Metropolitan Opera debut in 2004 as Boris in Káta Kabonová. He has been heard in recent seasons as Adolar in Weber’s Euryanthe in Amsterdam and Strasbourg; Loge in Das Rheingold at Berlin’s Deutsche Oper; Erik in Wagner’s Der fliegende Holländer at Berlin’s Deutsche Staatsoper; Edmund in the world premiere of Aulis Sallinen’s King Lear; and the title role in Britten’s Peter Grimes in Helsinki; Tamino in The Magic Flute in Toulouse; and Laca in Jenůfa at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden.

Bass-baritone Albert Dohmen appeared in the title role of Berg’s Wozzeck at the 1997 Salzburg Easter and Summer Festival with the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonic Orchestras, conducted by Claudio Abbado and directed by Peter Stein. Since then he has worked with conductors including Zubin Mehta, Giuseppe Sinopoli, James Conlon, Antonio Pappano, Edo de Waart, Seiji Ozawa, James Levine, Myung-Whun Chung, Kurt Masur, Lorin Maazel, Georg Solti, and Valery Gergiev. Mr. Dohmen has established himself as a leading Wotan, and has sung the role in complete Wagner Ring cycles at Trieste, Geneva, and Catania; at the Deutsche Oper Berlin and Vienna Staatsoper in 2003; at Netherlands Opera Amsterdam; and in his debut at the Bayreuth Festival in 2007. Other major Wagner roles have included Amfortas in Parsifal, Kurwenal in Tristan und Isolde, the Dutchman in Der fliegende Holländer, and Hans Sachs in Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. Mr. Dohmen has also played Jochanaan in R. Strauss’s Salome, the Commandant in Strauss’s Friedenstag, Bluebeard in Bartók’s Bluebeard’s Castle, and Scarpia in Puccini’s Tosca, among other roles. Mr. Dohmen last appeared with the New York Philharmonic on New Year’s Eve, 2004, in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, led by Kurt Masur.

Bass Thorsten Grümbel was born in Kiel, Germany, and studied voice at the music academies of Lübeck and Detmold in addition to taking part in master classes by Walter Berry, Roman Trekel, and John Shirley-Quirk. Guest engagements have taken him to Schwerin, Essen, Hanover, Leipzig, Nuremberg, and the Bavarian Staatsoper. In addition to an extensive concert schedule, he has performed numerous operatic roles, including Narbal in Berlioz’s Les Troyens; Zuniga in Bizet’s Carmen; Stromminger in Catalani’s La Wally; Melisso in Handel’s Alcina; General Lefort in Lortzing’s Zar und Zimmerman; Masetto in Mozart’s Don Giovanni; Sarastro in Mozart’s The Magic Flute; Colline in Puccini’s La Bohème; Don Basilio in Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia; Caronte in Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo; Truffaldin in R. Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos; Prince Germin in Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin; The King in Verdi’s Aida; Banquo in Verdi’s Macbeth; and Kothner in Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nürnenberg. Since the 1999–2000 season Mr. Grümbel has been a member of the German Opera on the Rhine.

The Westminster Symphonic Choir (WSC), directed by Joe Miller, is composed of students at Westminster Choir College of Rider University, and has recorded and performed with major orchestras under virtually every internationally known conductor of the last 75 years. In the 2009–10 season the choir will perform John Adams’s El Niño with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s; Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 with the San Francisco Symphony and Michael Tilson Thomas; and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9, led by Sir Roger Norrington at Carnegie Hall. The WSC’s 2008–09 season included a series of performances with the New York Philharmonic, including Handel’s Messiah, led by Ton Koopman, and Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé, conducted by Lorin Maazel. The choir also performed Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Mariss Jansons, and Mahler Symphonies Nos. 2, 3, and 8, with the Berlin Staatskapelle led by Pierre Boulez. The Women of the Westminster Symphonic Choir last appeared with the New York Philharmonic in February 2009, performing Mendelssohn’s Die erste Walpurgisnacht, led by Music Director Emeritus Kurt Masur.