Listening Logs
One of the things I wanted out of this course was to listen to music. I play a lot of music, and much of what I listen to is directly related to works I am preparing for performance. I tend not to listen to music in my downtime because it gets me too excited and instead of relaxing, I will get energized, pulled down rabbit holes, playing and writing throughout a seemingly endless descent. I don’t view this as a problem, it simply is. I do enjoy the act of listening, and I especially enjoy the opportunity to listen with intent.
I expected to listen to a substantial amount of European classical and romantic music, but I took the opportunity of this course’s open-endedness to include selections by Indian classical performers as well.
L.V. Beethoven – String Quartet in C# minor, Op. 131
Performed by The Danish String Quartet at Alice Tully Hall, 21 February 2016
My musical taste has always been broad. There is so much that I enjoy, but I can only enjoy so much at once. I’m listening to Beethoven’s string quartet in C-sharp minor because Beethoven (and others) consider it his best. Maybe among the best quartets period. I like Beethoven’s string quartets. The only CD in my car for well over a year has been a collection of his string quartets, so I’ve listened to this piece on the way to many recent life events. Listening with intent, however, I don’t find it particularly special. To me – specifically me in this moment of sitting down to listen to an “important” work with the intent of writing about it. Maybe my heart doesn’t need this piece right now. When it does, I’ll probably have very different things to say, but in this moment: yeah, Op. 131 is okay, I guess.
The thing is, this isn’t the quartet that jumps out at me when I’m listening to that CD which was curated by a friend of mine who has impeccable taste in music.
This piece is well performed. There are a lot of moments that I find quite compelling. The call and response – or maybe it’s less call and response than the cello interrupting the other three players who are forced to respond to the outburst. [This occurs a little past the halfway mark. It’s in movement IV.] It’s one of those little surprises, a defiance of form.
The passing of parts in movement V quite fun. Those fast, bouncy passages weaving together in a frantic joy, then passing the part to each other. Likewise, the pizzicato bits going back and forth. This definitely looks and sounds like a lot of fun to play. This is making me think of this quartet as tv show that everyone tells you is fantastic, you just have to get past the first couple of seasons.
Movement VII is getting very Beethoven-y. The big, loud finale, with a quiet penultimate fake-out coda before the last “surprise” ending.
While I’m finding a lot of this enjoyable, it’s not moving me emotionally. I’m in admiration of the performance and the cleverness of the composition, but it’s not really making me feel much. This could be due to my current state of mind. My attention is being called elsewhere and I’m forcing myself to listen to this as part of an assignment. Even though it was my decision to listen to this particular piece, there is a small but strong bit of resentment that I “have” to do this. So maybe I’ll stop here.
These notes are from my first listen of Emilie Mayer’s Faust Overture. I’m generally familiar with the story, so I have some frame of reference and imagery going in.
There is an ominous start. The low, minor feel slowly climbs melodically. It fills out into a "fantasy-like" sound – very rich. Tension builds - something's not right in the forest. I hear the hook – that repeating motif over slow chord changes.
Then there is drama. Action - a chase? The music is very “filmic,” evoking images of action. Operatic/ballet.
Light, sweetness is allowed in for a short time. A church-like progression. Hearing that plagal cadence brings it home. Is there redemption? Salvation? Heroic, triumphant, but there is still struggle. Then more action!
Hearing some op the earlier themes coming back.
Then we fall back into quiet, light fantasy. Princess chillin’ music. Going back to church, very heroic now. More chill princess. (Faust can be a princess.)
Drama! Again!
Now we’re coming to a close. Rising, almost there, falling back down but there is a quick recovery. Big V I close. It is done.
That was definitely a ride. As I mentioned in above, there is a very “filmic” quality to the overture. That’s probably too modern a descriptor though, considering this piece was written around 1880. My first association with music like this is accompanying film (or ballets that I watched on videocassette) so there’s my cultural background processing this through its filter. “Programmatic” would be a more appropriate term. This piece is very exciting. I distinctly remember an orchestra performing at my school as a kid. It wasn’t Peter and the Wolf, but that’s all I can think of when I try to remember what they actually performed. It was so evocative of a fantasy adventure. I remember closing my eyes and letting the story appear in my mind. I didn’t know music could do that. Who needs pictures! While the tone of this piece is very different (clearly a different kind of story is being told) it brought me back to that feeling of letting the music paint a vivid scene.
Bio Break: Emilie Mayer
Source: FemBio’s article on Emilie Mayer
Source: The Classical Nerd’s video on Emilie Mayer
Okay, so who is Emilie Mayer? She was born in Friedland, Germany on May 14, 1812. She began taking piano lessons at age five and encouraged to pursue music despite society’s expectation that girls prepare for a future of caregiving.
There was a fair amount of tragedy in her youth. Her mother died when Emilie was young. After her father committed suicide in 1840, there was nothing left to keep her at home, so she left to study composition.
Mayer was very prolific. She wrote eight symphonies, fifteen overtures, and ten string quartets along with many compositions lost to time.
Though she was busy busting gender norms, Mayer and her music were generally well received. She was based in Berlin and her works were performed in and around Germany.
Here’s a fun Faust-fact. Mayer may have received pushback from those who wanted to maintain the status quo (that’s a nice way of saying they were terrified of women) but that didn’t deter her from forging ahead. She’d already written symphonies, something considered to be meant for men to do, so why not tackle this “masculine” task of writing a “Faust Overture?” After all, Wagner, Schumann, and Berlioz did it, so why not Mayer too?
This exhibits that duality of romantic and classical. Almost like she’s in a classical box and bows keep bursting out the sides wherever she has something to say that can’t be stated within the given form.
Nice melody with a bit of call and response between players. Very playful at times.
Very chirpy for G minor. I like all the chromatic passages
Heard that churchy cadence in this one too. There are moments where each instrument sounds like it’s in its own world before crashing into homophony with the other players. Very rad.
Scherzo
2nd movement starts out quite bouncy. There are pizz moments incredibly brief but are everything to me.
Adagio
Quite lush. Very pretty, spiked with "classical moves.”
Allegro
Urgent. As an allegro probably should be. We’re running out of time. This is the last movement.
***I found a note where I said I wasn’t feeling this piece. I’m definitely not getting that from what I wrote above, and listening again as I assemble this entry, I’m finding it cool and interesting. There is definitely a “classical” vibe that I’m typically less fond of, (many exceptions when it comes to Mozart) but I’m not repelled by the quality here. Maybe it was the day. Sometimes it needs to be the right day for a song/piece.***
The YouTube algorithm introduced me to Ethel Smyth’s String Quartet in E minor. Below I have organized my notes from my first listen.
I. Allegretto lirico
When it started playing, I thought it could have been more of Emilie Mayer. Ethel, however, digs into her weird side a little more. I’m loving the dramatic tremolo under melody. Lots of “record skip” repeats I’m into. Similar to Mayer, there is a classical-like formality to this quartet, though Smyth seems to inject more asides into her composition. Such a satisfying conclusion to 1st movement.
II. Allegro molto leggiero
The second movement slaps. Plucky, cool groove, consonant harmonically, dissonant in structure? Very cool! Full of left turns. Ethel Smyth is dope. Blues bass just shows up and leaves. Like, it walks in, not my scene, then walks back out. There’s some aggressive, metal-like chugging happening and I’m here for it.
III. Andante
Lush, mournful almost. Ooh, that bass! It goes from low notes to "skipping" up the octave.
IV. Allegro energico
Is she quoting mozart’s sonata in A?
Bio Break: Ethel Smyth
Ethel Smyth lived from 1858 to 1944. Born in London, she butted heads with her father, a military man, who didn’t want her to study music. She demanded an education and went on to study at Leipzig Conservatory, an early win in her lifelong battle against the patriarchy.
In Leipzig, she was developing a name for herself and hanging out with the likes of Johannes Brahms, Antonín Dvořák, and Clara Schummann. Pyotr Tchaikovsky spoke highly of her in his memoirs, though he framed her as an exception to the rule of a woman’s place in musical composition.
In 1893 she premiered her Mass in D which was a significant boost to her public profile. She went on to write a series of operas: Fantasio, Der Wald, and Der Standrecht, which would later be known as The Wreckers once translated to English.
Smyth was constantly fighting to get her works performed. She was confident in her work and didn’t want others messing with it. Often, when her works were being performed, conductors or other powers that be would make cuts and rewrite sections of her work. Rightfully angry about this, she would sneak into rehearsal spaces to restore parts of her music that was cut, unbeknownst to the conductor.
Smyth was active in the English suffragette movement and one of her pieces, The March of Women, became an anthem for The Women's Social and Political Union. Never one to back down from a fight, Smyth earned two months in prison after throwing rocks at the windows of politicians with fellow protesters.
Later in life, Smyth began to lose her hearing. It was then she began to pivot from composing music to writing memoirs. In those later years, she received honorary degrees from several universities, including an honorary doctorate in music from Oxford University.
Sources and links for further study:
Website dedicated to Smyth: https://www.ethelsmyth.org/
Britannica: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ethel-Smyth
British Library: https://www.bl.uk/people/ethel-smyth
LGBT Archive: https://www.lgbthistoryuk.org/wiki/Ethel_Smyth