Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827)

In Beethoven's even numbered symphonies, a gentler side of the titan from Bonn emerges. Coming between the revolutionary Third (Eroica) and the tempestuous Fifth, the Fourth Symphony is warmly bucolic, a font of lyricism (without affectation). The Austrian conductor Josef Krips found Beethoven's Symphony No. 4 in B-flat Major marked by "a divine lightness of spirit...a study in serenity." Within this joyous confection, Beethoven created a slow movement of deep emotion and depth, suggesting a flickering sadness beneath the surface.

Beethoven presented the first performance of his Fourth Symphony on March 1, 1807 in Vienna. (The score was probably written in the summer of 1806, shortly after completion of the Fourth Piano Concerto and the first of the Razumovsky quartets. It is the first of Beethoven's nine symphonies that has survived in the original autograph manuscript.) The Viennese musical public appreciated the high spirits and elegance of this symphony more than the composer's monumental efforts. For early audiences, the Eroica was an inexplicable mystery. The Fourth found Beethoven writing in a manner that listeners could connect with the symphonies of Haydn or Mozart. Yet this score still reveals Beethoven's original voice from the unease of the slow introduction to the surprising contrasts of dynamics in the witty finale.

An aura of mystery pervades the Adagio introduction. Beginning with the first chord (on winds and plucked strings), there seems to be a dramatic subtext, which is dispelled by sudden forte chords in the full ensemble. Instantaneously the mood changes as a high spirited figure (barely a theme) takes wing at high speed — Allegro vivace indeed. The bassoon introduces the quirky second subject, followed by an affirmative third theme (first in the winds, then in by the entire orchestra). The development section is brief but not without typical Beethoven-esque strife, however light spirited. In the recapitulation the principal themes return for an exultant climax.

The second movement Adagio is lyrical, highly expressive and suggests something deeper beneath the elegant veneer — perhaps Beethoven's increasing deafness and tragedy intrudes ever so briefly. There are surprise gestures from the timpani near the movement's conclusion. Festivities return in the third movement, a mischievous theme sweeping through the orchestra; the trio section likewise impish (here spotlighting the winds). A whirlwind theme launches the high spirited finale (definitely worthy of Haydn) while a more elegant fragment serves as a secondary subject. Beethoven's development alternates loud and soft dynamic levels (more in jest than shock) before the solo bassoon restates the principal melody. Again there are surprising pauses and contrasts right down to the score's final bars. The Fourth Symphony is one of Beethoven's most attractive and bubbly scores, still pervaded by the masterly hand of a genius.

—Program Notes by Lawrence Budmen

Niccolo Paganini (1782–1840)

Niccolo Paganini was the rock star of his age. A violin virtuoso of the highest order, he was also an unabashed showman, frequently wearing capes and extinguishing lights to add atmosphere to his supercharged performances. Paganini was also a daring innovator, literally reinventing violin technique, adding a new bag of tricks and daring bravura flights to the instrument's repertoire. (Partly because of his showmanship and partly out of jealousy and envy from less gifted musicians, the ridiculous rumor that Paganini was in league with the devil was floated.) After playing concertmaster in the Napoleonic court orchestras in Lucca and Florence, Paganini toured throughout Europe. His acclaim in London and Paris was particularly overwhelming.

Paganini's talents as a composer were Program Notes 104 often underestimated. Rossini and Berlioz were friends and admirers of his music. Beyond his penchant for bravura display, the Italian violinist was a wonderful melodist. Paganini took his inspiration from Italian opera, creating ravishing bel canto arias for the violin. The owner of numerous Guarneri and Stradivarius violins and violas, Paganini wrote twenty four caprices for solo violin — considered landmarks in the evolution of the instrument. In addition to creating numerous short pieces, Paganini crafted several concertos for violin and orchestra, large scale showpieces of incredible technical difficulty.

While not as popular as Paganini's first violin concerto, the Concerto No. 2 in B minor is a work of greater depth, rich in Italianate melodic beauty. Composed in 1826, the score became one of Paganini's concert mainstays. In our time such violinists as Ruggiero Ricci and Salvatore Accardo have performed the score to great acclaim. The opening Allegro maestoso is in traditional form with two principal themes. The violin's flights into the instrument's highest reaches signal the composer's artistic signature. The second movement Adagio is an operatic cavatina, an aria of pure instrumental song. In the famous finale Rondo a la chochette, Paganini pulls out all the stops. Known as "La Campanella," Franz Liszt set a piano etude to the same theme and adapted some of Paganini's variations. The difficult high harmonics in this movement took the violin to new vistas. Not until the Spanish born Pablo de Sarasate and the Belgian Eugene Ysaye turned their instrumental skills to composition was anything of comparable difficulty conceived for the violin. With its endless flow of lovely melodies, virtuosic pizzazz and sheer flair for showmanship, Paganini's B minor concerto is one of the most dazzling scores ever created for the instrument.

Franz von Suppé (1819–1895)

Franz von Suppé was born in Spalato, Dalmatia (now the city of Split, Croatia). After moving to Vienna in 1835 Suppé flirted with the law and chemistry but his prodigious musical gifts won out. Soon playing in theater orchestras, he was beguiled by the distinctively French opera comique of Jacques Offenbach and determined to develop a Viennese counterpart. Eventually becoming staff conductor at several Viennese theaters devoted to light entertainment, Suppé produced a solid hit with one of his first operetta scores — Poet and Peasant, remembered today for its schmaltzy overture. Although he wrote operas, masses, instrumental works and much incidental music for dramatic productions, Suppé's greatest success and lasting legacy are his forty operettas. Many of these works are still performed in Europe (at houses such as the Vienna Volksoper and Munich's Theater am Gartnerplatz) and at summer operetta festivals. Johann Strauss' effervescent Die Fledermaus, Gypsy Baron, and A Night in Venice could hardly be imagined without Suppé's pioneering work in the genre. The overtures to Suppé's comic operas have become concert staples, beloved by conductors and audiences alike.

Light Cavalry received its premiere in Vienna in 1866. A period drama about a ruler who squanders his nation's treasury on funding a dance company for his mistress, a Hungarian ballerina, and the attempt of military aristocrats to stage a coup, Light Cavalry suggests a decidedly Hungarian strain in its musical palette as well as Viennese élan (a formula that would later be adopted by Franz Lehar and Emmerich Kalman). The overture opens with a trumpet call suggesting a military motif. After considerable brass and percussion flourishes, the principal theme emerges, introduced by the brass and then repeated forte by the full ensemble. Some commentators have suggested that this material represents a cavalry ride through the plains of Hungary. (That view is certainly congruent with the operetta's scenario.) The strings play a languorous theme of Magyar cast before the military subjects returns at full throttle and the overture concludes with a festive repetition of the opening fanfare.