MacDowell premieres

Synopsis

On today's date in 1896, the Boston Symphony paid a visit to New York City, giving a concert at the old Metropolitan Opera House on Broadway and 39th Street. Emil Paur was the conductor, and the star soloist was the American pianist and composer Edward MacDowell, who performed his own Piano Concerto No. 1. Also on the program was the world premiere performance of a new orchestral suite by MacDowell, his Second, which bore the subtitle "Indian."

In a prefatory note, MacDowell acknowledged that he used actual Native American themes in his Suite, although the symphonic development of them was original. MacDowell composed this music decades before such acts of "cultural appropriation" became a hot-button issue, and around the time that Antonin Dvořák was urging all American composers to look to the music of Native and African-Americans as the basis of a uniquely American sound.

The critic of The New York Times, for one, was impressed. "The suite," he wrote, "is even a more remarkable and brilliant work than its author's previous successes have justified us in expecting. At its close, the composer was twice called out and forced to bow his acknowledgement."

"Of all my music," confessed MacDowell in 1903, "the 'Dirge' in the 'Indian' Suite pleases me most. It affects me deeply and did when I was writing it. In it, an Indian woman laments the death of her son, but to me, as I wrote it, it seems to express a world-sorrow rather than a particular grief."

Music Played in Today's Program

Edward MacDowell (1860 –1908) Piano Concerto No. 1 Seta Tanyel, piano; BBC Scottish Symphony; Martyn Brabbins, cond. Hyperion 67165

Edward MacDowell Suite No. 2 (Indian) Ulster Orchestra; Takuo Yuasa, cond. Naxos 8.559075

On This Day

Births

• 1752 - Italian composer Muzio Clementi, in Rome;

• 1878 - English composer Rutland Boughton, in Aylesbury;

Deaths

• 1837 - Irish composer John Field, age 54, in Moscow (Julian date: Jan.11);

• 1908 - American composer and pianist Edward MacDowell, age 47, in New York;

• 1981 - American composer Samuel Barber, age 70, in New York;

Premieres

• 1724 - Bach: Sacred Cantata No. 73 ("Herr, wie du willst, so schicks mit mir") performed on the 3rd Sunday after Epiphany as part of Bach's first annual Sacred Cantata cycle in Leipzig (1723/24);

• 1729 - Bach: Sacred Cantata No. 156 ("Ich steh mit einem Fuss im Grabe") probably performed in Leipzig on the 3rd Sunday after Epiphany as part of Bach's fourth annual Sacred Cantata cycle (to texts by Christian Friedrich Henrici, a.k.a. "Picander") during 1728/29;

• 1895 - MacDowell: Suite No. 2 (":Indian"), at the old Metropolitan Opera House in New York City, by the Boston Symphony, with Emil Paur conducting; On the same program, MacDowell appeared as the soloist in his own Piano Concerto No. 1;

• 1933 - Bartók: Piano Concerto No. 2, in Frankfurt, with Hans Robaud conducting and the composer as soloist;

• 1936 - Chavez: "Sinfonia India," on a radio broadcast by the Columbia Symphony, conducted by the composer;

• 1948 - Diamond: Symphony No. 4, by the Boston Symphony, Leonard Bernstein conducting;

• 1963 - Peter Mennin: Symphony No. 7, by the Cleveland Orchestra, George Szell conducting;

• 1973 - Elliott Carter: String Quartet No. 3, in New York City, by the Juilliard String Quartet; This work won the Pulitzer Prize for music in that year (This was Carter's second Pulitzer Prize);

• 1999 - Thea Musgrave: "Three Women," in San Francisco, by the Women's Philharmonic, A. Hsu conducting;

Others

• 1894 - Czech composer Antonin Dvorák presents a concert of African-American choral music at Madison Square Concert Hall in New York, using an all-black choir, comprised chiefly of members of the St. Philip's Colored Choir; On the program was the premiere performance of Dvorák's own arrangement of Stephen Foster's "Old Folks at Home," which featured vocal soloists Sissierette Jones and Harry T. Burleigh;

• 1943 - Duke Ellington and his orchestra present their first concert at Carngie Hall in New York, presenting the "official" premiere of Ellington's "Black, Brown and Beige" Suite (This work had received its world premiere at a trial performance the preceding day at Rye High School in Rye, New York).