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2 Elisabeth Leonskaja Piano Recital Biography 6 Programme 10 Programme Notes Robert Schumann 2 Papillons, Op 2 12 Unless otherwise specified, all photographs Jean Mayerat Johannes Brahms 118 Six Piano Pieces, Op Four Piano Pieces, Op 119 Franz Schubert B D960 Piano Sonata in B flat major, D960 Feature The Emotional Art of Elisabeth Leonskaja Concert Hall Hong Kong Cultural Centre Running time: approximately 1 hour and 45 minutes with a 20 minute interval To make this performance a pleasant experience for the artists and other members of the audience, PLEASE switch off your alarm watches, MOBILE PHONES and PAGERS. Eating and drinking, unauthorised photography and audio or video recording are forbidden in the auditorium. Thank you for your co-operation.

3 Elisabeth Leonskaja holds a distinguished position among the leading international pianists. Of Russian origin, she studied under Jacob Milstein at the Moscow Conservatory, and won the prestigious Enesco, Marguerite Long and Queen Elizabeth Competitions before emigrating from the former Soviet Union and settling in Vienna in She had also given many concerts, which included duets with Sviatoslav Richter in a partnership that had a profound influence on her subsequent

4 Biography / development as an artist. However it was her sensational debut at the 1979 Salzburg Festival that rapidly brought her name to the attention of western audiences. Since then she has given countless recitals at numerous international music festivals and is a frequent guest in some of the world s most prestigious concert halls. Recent and future seasons have and will include appearances at the Edinburgh, Vienna, Schleswig-Holstein Festivals as well as the International Piano Series in London, Paris, Brussels and Berlin. During the 2002/03 season Leonskaja was the Artist-in-Residence at the magnificent new Dortmund Konzerthaus. She regularly appears as a soloist across Europe and works with many of the leading conductors such as Kurt Masur, Christoph Eschenbach, Mariss Jansons, Yuri Temirkanov and many others. Among the orchestras with whom she has performed recently are the Berlin Philharmonic, the Vienna Symphony, the Munich Philharmonic, the Zurich Tonhalle, the London Philharmonic, the Orchestre de Paris and the Czech Philharmonic. Her North American debut with the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra at the Hollywood Bowl Festival was followed by invitations to appear with the Cleveland Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic and other American orchestras. Critics agree that warmth, stylishness and elegance distinguish her virtuoso playing. A committed chamber musician, Leonskaja collaborates closely with the Alban Berg, the Borodin and Guarneri Quartets as well as Heinrich Schiff and the Vienna Philharmonic Chamber Ensemble. Last year the Vienna Konzerthaus presented her in a series of concerts featuring piano quintets with some of the world s greatest string quartet players. Her recordings have received a number of prestigious international prizes including the Caecilia Prize for her recording of Brahms piano sonatas and the coveted Diapason d Or for her recording of works by Franz Liszt. 7

5 Programme ( ) 2 ( ) 118 A A G F F E 119 B E C E ( ) B D :00-6:

6 Robert Schumann ( ) Papillons, Op 2 Introduzione Presto Pomposo Allegro vivace Allegretto cantabile Allegro molto Semplice Allegro con brio Presto Meno mosso Allegro con spirito Finale. Allegro Johannes Brahms ( ) Six Piano Pieces, Op 118 Intermezzo in A minor Intermezzo in A major Ballade in G minor Intermezzo in F minor Romance in F major Intermezzo in E flat minor Four Piano Pieces, Op 119 Intermezzo in B minor Intermezzo in E minor Intermezzo in C major Rhapsody in E flat major Interval Franz Schubert ( ) Piano Sonata in B flat major, D960 Festival Plus Molto moderato Andante sostenuto Scherzo. Allegro vivace con delicatezza Allegro ma non troppo (Fri) 2:00-6:00pm Masterclass Recital Hall, Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts Instructor: Elisabeth Leonskaja Conducted in German with English and Cantonese interpretation For details, please refer to Festival Plus booklet, or visit the Festival website 11

7 Programme Notes D (1834) (1837) 12

8 Robert Schumann Papillons, Op 2 In a letter to his family, written from Leipzig in April 1832, Robert Schumann asked that everyone read the last scene in Jean Paul s Flegeljahre as soon as possible, because the Papillons is intended as a musical representation of that masquerade. He was referring to the climactic scene of Jean Paul Richter s Fledgling Years (1804), set at a Shrove Tuesday masquerade ball. This Larven-Tanz chapter provides Schumann with several layers of meaning, with the metamorphosis from larva to butterfly (papillon) symbolic of the transformation of the novel s main characters, now depicted through music. Schumann had completed Papillons partly from pieces composed much earlier. Unified only loosely by an overall tonal centre of D major and recurring motifs, the constantly shifting tonal centres and wide array of melodic material bewildered many early listeners. The introduction begins with a unison passage that suggests a rising curtain, or perhaps a couple walking gracefully onto the dance floor, followed by a delicate waltz. With the evening underway, the individual dances cascade past. A brief Presto clears the floor for what seems to be a heavy gentleman who takes himself very seriously. We hear this Pomposo melody first in the left hand in octaves, then in the right. The ideas are developed a bit and then a new dance begins. Each piece is set in vivid contrast to the one that precedes it: a swirling Allegro vivace then a delicate Allegro cantabile, Semplice followed by an Allegro con brio. Eventually Pomposo returns to the dance floor for a quick turn. Contrasts grow more pronounced as the night wears on, and finally we hear the familiar tune of the Grossvatertanz, or Grandfather Dance, the customary final number. At this point in the score, Schumann noted The noise of the carnival dies away and The tower clock strikes six. In response to those who where looking to Die Flegeljahre for a simple programme Schumann soon became uneasy, writing that he had underlaid the text to the music and not the reverse. The relationship between his music and the book is certainly more complex and the slender proportions of Papillons belies the work s importance as a starting point for Schumann, who would go on to blend literary and musical traditions in even greater works throughout the decade, and use the masked ball as the figurative setting in both Carnaval (1834), and the Davidsbündlertänze (1837). 13

9 (1879) /1 118/1 A A G F

10 Johannes Brahms Six Piano Pieces, Op 118 Four Piano Pieces, Op 119 It had been with Robert Schumann s help in the early 1850s that Johannes Brahms secured his first publications, thereby establishing himself as a professional composer. Forty years later and now widely regarded as the true successor of Beethoven and Schubert, Brahms was preparing to close what he had begun as a young man. In December 1890, he wrote to his publisher, Simrock, notifying him that with his Op 111 Quintet he would be retiring. After many years of hard work he wanted to relax, but soon found that he still had some tidying up to do. Between 1892 and 1893 he returned to his preferred instrument, producing four collections of short piano pieces, Opuses Brahms completed the final two sets, the Six Piano Pieces, Op 118 and Four Piano Pieces, Op 119, in the summer of 1893 at the resort town of Bad Ischl. He left few clues to his compositional processes, but there is evidence that some of these pieces may have dated from years earlier and that he may have been occupied mostly with assembling them into collections and rounding them off. As in other late works, they are all essentially songs without words. However, whereas in Op 76 (1879) and Op 116 Brahms alternated the more serious intermezzo with the lighter capriccio, much in the manner of Schumann s works of the 1830s, in these two sets he dispenses with the capriccio. To the four Intermezzos of Op 118 he adds a Ballade and a Romance, and following the three Intermezzos of Op 119 he ends with a single, expansive Rhapsody that balances all that precedes it. All the elements of his mature style are present in these ten pieces. Whether subdued or serious, they contain little outward display. Melodies are often placed in the inner voices and sometimes even obscured, as in Op 119, No 1. His harmonies are conservative by the standards of the late 19th century. He favours relationships of a third. In Op 118, No 1 he withholds the central tonality of A minor until nearly the very end, and then closes on A major, the key of the elegiac Intermezzo No 2. Most of the pieces are in clear, ABA forms. The bold outer sections of the Ballade in G minor are sharply contrasted with the more tender middle section. The Intermezzo in F minor is similarly constructed. In the final Intermezzo of Op 118, a passionate middle section provides respite from an otherwise unrelentingly sombre conclusion to the set. 16

11 If Brahms viewed these works as the private, final statements of an aging musician it did not prevent others from appreciating them soon after they were completed. Before submitting them to his publisher he sent copies to the elderly Clara Schumann, who played for Brahms from the Op 118 at their last meeting, in Schumann s student Ilona Eibenschütz played the pieces in London in 1894, where they were well received by English music critics. In Vienna, Arnold Schoenberg looked on these late works as precursors of expressionism, hearing in them intensely personal utterances of regret and longing. Interval Conrtesy of IMG Artists 17

12 B D (D958 D959 D960) B G G B F C B 18

13 Franz Schubert Piano Sonata in B flat major, D960 Even by his own prolific standards, in the final year of his short life Franz Schubert produced an astounding number of fine works, many of them of stunning originality. Among these works, one finds his only complete piano trios, his only string quintet, his only chamber fantasies, a set of piano impromptus, and his last three piano sonatas (D958, D959 and D960). Schubert s final piano sonatas provided a satisfying conclusion to a genre he had explored throughout his life. Most of his sonatas would be forgotten, and await rediscovery in the 20th century. The final sonatas are among Schubert s most personal works, and their completion was especially urgent for him. Having previously sketched the broad outlines of the sonatas, and now working at a furious pace, he completed all three in September 1828, just two months before his death. The influence of Schubert s recently completed song cycle Winterreise hangs heavily over these final sonatas. Based on 24 poems by Wilhelm Müller, Winterreise tells a wanderer s story of loneliness and longing for death. It was a subject that resonated very strongly for Schubert, who had chosen a solitary life and since 1822 lived with the expectation of an early death after contracting syphilis. In the sonata, as in Winterreise, Schubert makes use of a subtle cyclical organisation, linking material in each of the four movements. These often imperceptible relationships bring continuity and balance some of Schubert s harmonic adventures and jarring effects. He favours the odd juxtaposition of contrasting materials, as in the first movement of the B flat sonata, where the serene and harmonically stable first theme group ends with a menacing low trill on G flat. The process is repeated with an excursion into the second key area (G flat), followed by a clear return to B flat, and then an abrupt jump into the more remote key of F sharp minor for the second theme group. The overall tone of the second movement is profound and subdued. Its remote key of C sharp minor is foreshadowed in the development section of the first movement. The tone of the Scherzo is light and buoyant. It returns us to B flat major. The concluding Rondo is lighter in mood than the finales of the two preceding sonatas, and provides a counterbalance to the pathos of the first two movements. Programme Notes by Brian C Thompson 19

14 B D960 Feature

15 The Emotional Art of Elisabeth Leonskaja by Robert Turnbull When critics refer to pianist Elisabeth Leonskaja as distinguished, the impression conveyed is of an establishment figure resting comfortably on her laurels. In fact she is anything but that. Leonskaja can enrapture, mesmerise, fascinate, even confound and irritate if the mood takes her. By harnessing a formidable technique and the gift of generosity, she creates live performances that are both personal and individually memorable. Leonskaja s preferred repertory is romantic, pride of place given to the masterpieces of Brahms, Schumann, Chopin and Liszt. Brahms last compositions for the piano are among his most intimate expressions. The 1879 Opuses 118 and 119, alternately gentle and vigorous, are written with a concentration and intensity lacking in his previous piano pieces. The other composer with whom she has a special affinity is Schubert. For Leonskaja, Schubert s late great sonatas might lack the dramatic pathos of Beethoven at his best, but are as outstanding for their melodic power and melancholy mood. Schubert s music has a particular poetical expression which is not easy to render, she says. The length and melodic lines, especially in the late sonatas, cause some difficulty and require a certain sensibility and style. But the overwhelming problem is knowing how to find the balance between what are, on the one hand, symphonic poems of almost Brucknerian vastness with music moving in a unique poetical world. Schubert talks above all about intimacy. Awareness of these essential contrasts is very much at the root of Leonskaja s musical thinking. However her style, the element that marks her out from many of her contemporaries, is the courage to play with emotion, to add the crucial dimension of feeling surprisingly absent in much of today s music making. She is also a master of surprise and the enemy of predictability. Whereas one pianist might observe the classical and balanced structure of a piece, Leonskaja will stress its romantic and rhapsodic qualities with flamboyancy and panache; or rush headlong into the piece like some Florida-bound hurricane. As Michael Tumelty in The Herald wrote of her 2004 Edinburgh Festival recital, her incredible lightness at some moments was offset by powerhouse thunder at others, her sense of repose by the rage and fury, rather than mere drama at yet others. If the word mercurial did not exist it would have to be invented for this remarkable musician. 21

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國立桃園高中96學年度新生始業輔導新生手冊目錄彰化考區 104 年國中教育會考簡章簡章核定文號 : 彰化縣政府 104 年 01 月 27 日府教學字第 1040027611 號函中華民國 104 年 2 月 9 日彰化考區 104 年國中教育會考試務會編印主辦學校 : 國立鹿港高級中學地址 :50546 彰化縣鹿港鎮