Notes by Dr. Natalie Wren

OLIVIER MESSIAEN: Thème et variations (1932)
“And I realized that I also connected colours to sounds, but intellectually, not with my eyes. In fact, when I hear or read music, I always see colour complexes in my mind that go with the sound…”

Gifted with synesthesia—a neurological condition that causes the brain to process information through multiple senses at once—French composer Olivier Messiaen could perceive colors when he heard sounds. His unique ability to see music through an ever-moving kaleidoscope of colors led to a highly individualized compositional style. Through his use of colors, complex rhythms, and harmonic modes, Messiaen would “produce pictures” via sound, making his music deeply expressive and profoundly religious. The avid concertgoer might be familiar with Messiaen’s unique use of colors, and his penchant for birdsongs, in his later works, particularly Quatuor pour la fin du monde.

With his wedding day quickly approaching, twenty-five-year-old Olivier Messiaen presented Thème et variations as a gift to his new wife Claire Delbos, a violinist and composer, in June of 1932. They premiered the piece several months later in Paris. More conventional in form than his later works, Thème et variations reflects the young composer’s experimentation with his own distinctive voice. The work is comprised of a simple theme sung plaintively by the violin, which is then followed by five variations that become increasingly more elaborate and distant from the original theme. A truly equal partner in this piece, the piano introduces each variation. Flowing effortlessly into one another, the variations are based as much on rhythmic inventions as melodic or harmonic departure. The second variation moves more quickly than the first, beginning the long race up to the climactic final variation, which features a clear return of the theme in the upper register of the violin, played above lush, organ-like sonorities in the piano. After a searing climax, as described by musicologist Elizabeth Bergman “the whole piece seems almost to jump off a cliff and float gently down, coming to a satisfying conclusion.”

LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN: Violin Sonata No. 10 in G Major (1812)
In 1812, the year Beethoven composed his tenth and final violin sonata, he wrote to his secret love, his Immortal Beloved,

“Though still in bed, my thoughts go out to you, my Immortal Beloved, Be calm–love me–today–yesterday–what tearful longings for you–you–you–my life–my all–farewell. Oh continue to love me–never misjudge the most faithful heart of your beloved. Ever thine. Ever mine. Ever ours.”

Such loving tenderness seems out of place from the established picture of Beethoven as a dark and tormented genius. Those familiar with Beethoven’s compositional style, particularly from his middle period, expect his music to encompass the defiance, turbulence, and grandiose heroism heard in his Fifth Symphony or Appassionata piano sonata. But in his Violin Sonata No. 10 we encounter a gentler, wistful Beethoven.

Written ten years after his ninth violin sonata, the monumental “Kreutzer,” Beethoven wrote this elegant sonata for his student and devoted patron Archduke Rudolf, who performed the premiere with famed violinist Pierre Rode. The sonata opens as if in mid-thought with a trilled gesture in the violin that is then embraced by the piano, calling to mind soft birdcalls floating on a summer breeze. Graceful and warm, the first movement is marked almost entirely piano and pianissimo. Now in the second movement, violinist Abram Loft said, “the players are as close to paradise as one can approach in this world.” One of Beethoven’s most beautiful Adagios, the violin and piano close the movement as if suspended in time, before diving into a short and syncopated Scherzo movement. Of the fourth movement Beethoven wrote to the Archduke,

“I have not hurried unduly to compose the last movement, as in view of Rode’s playing I have had to give thought to the composition of this movement. In our finales we like to have fairly noisy passages, but R does not care for them – and so I have been rather hampered.”

Beethoven eventually settled on a folksy theme and variations, rife with detours and unexpected harmonies that organically flow together like a musical stream of consciousness. Together, this sonata reflects that of a mature composer now only able to hear music in his head, and of the tenderness and profound joy found in his last creative period.

PAUL CHIHARA: “Storm” from Four Reveries on Beethoven for Solo Piano (2018)
Notes from the composer Paul Chihara: “Storm” is a reverie inspired by Beethoven’s immortal Tempest Sonata (which in German is called “Sturm”). My tempestuous little piece was originally commissioned in 2018 by the Israeli pianist Yael Weiss. I later composed three other reveries, creating a suite of four bagatelles, all inspired by Beethoven piano sonatas, each in a contemporary pop, Jazz or Boogie Woogie style. The complete set of four was premiered by Yuki Takahashi in Tokyo in July of 2020.

PAUL CHIHARA: “Storm” from Four Reveries on Beethoven for Solo Piano (2018)
Notes from the composer Paul Chihara: “Storm” is a reverie inspired by Beethoven’s immortal Tempest Sonata (which in German is called “Sturm”). My tempestuous little piece was originally commissioned in 2018 by the Israeli pianist Yael Weiss. I later composed three other reveries, creating a suite of four bagatelles, all inspired by Beethoven piano sonatas, each in a contemporary pop, Jazz or Boogie Woogie style. The complete set of four was premiered by Yuki Takahashi in Tokyo in July of 2020.

MAURICE RAVEL: Sonata No. 2 in G Major for Violin and Piano (1927)
Known for his meticulous approach to writing music—Igor Stravinsky described him as “the most perfect of Swiss watchmakers”—Maurice Ravel spent even more time on his second violin sonata than usual. In a whirl of inspiration following years of writer’s block and depression, the French Impressionist composer took four years to complete this piece. Originally intended for the violinist Hélène Jourdan-Morhange, by April 1922 he was already delinquent, writing to her, “You won’t kill me on this account? To encourage you to bear with me, I have composed a Berceuse.” By the time Ravel had finished the piece, Jourdan-Morhange had developed arthritis and retired from her violin career. And so this, his last chamber work, was premiered in 1927 by Romanian composer George Enescu, with Ravel on piano.

By the 1920s American jazz had arrived in Paris; blue notes and syncopated rhythms could be heard throughout the City of Light. With jazz music playing all over the city in cafés and brasseries, composers like Debussy and Ravel were bringing jazz elements into the concert hall. In 1928 Ravel wrote an article for Musical Digest titled “Take Jazz Seriously!” in which he claimed, “Abroad we take jazz seriously. It is influencing our work. The Blues in my sonata, par example, is stylized jazz, more French than American in character perhaps, but nevertheless influenced strongly by your so-called ‘popular music.’”

While Ravel did not typically stray from conventional forms, his music is often characterized by a unique exploration of timbre and an adventurous harmonic style, both of which are present in his Violin Sonata in G. In the first movement we have an airy Allegretto with long, ethereal lyricism in the violin that floats over shifting modal harmonies. But it is in the Blues movement that we find the centerpiece of Ravel’s jazz-inflected sonata. Throughout the movement, both instruments alternate roles as soloist with a soulful blues melody, and as accompanist with syncopated rhythms and flat-seventh harmonies. The violin virtuoso reclaims center stage in the Perpetuum mobile with a relentless and fiery sprint to the finish line.