Nancarrow's Quartet No. 3

Synopsis

Expatriate American composer Conlon Nancarrow came to the conclusion that the rhythmically complex, intricate contrapuntal music he wanted to write would be too difficult for mere mortals to tackle, so he composed for a mechanical instrument: the player piano.

Despite its complexity, Nancarrow’s music drew some of its inspiration from the human, all-too-human jazz stylings of Art Tatum and Earl Hines, and the complex rhythmic patterns of music from India.

Nancarrow was born in 1912 in Texarkana, Arkansas. At 18, he heard Igor Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, which sparked his life-long interest in rhythmic complexity. Soon after, Nancarrow began private studies with American composers Roger Sessions and Walter Piston. He moved to Mexico City in 1940, where he lived and worked until his death.

Nancarrow composed in almost total isolation until the late 1970s, when some of his piano roll compositions appeared on record. These created quite an impact, and the MacArthur Foundation awarded him its Genius Award. Late fame even brought a series of commissions from performers willing to take on the challenge of performing his difficult music. One of these pieces, his String Quartet No. 3, was premiered on today’s date in 1987 by the Arditti Quartet.

Music Played in Today's Program

Conlon Nancarrow (1912-1997): String Quartet No. 3; Arditti Quartet; Grammavision 79440

On This Day

Births

• 1775 - Finnish-born Swedish composer Bernhard Crusell, in Nystad (Uusikaupunki), Finland

• 1844 - German philosopher and occasional composer Friedrich Nietzsche, in Röcken, near Lützen

• 1905 - Swedish composer Dag Wirén, in Noraberg, Oerebro

Deaths

• 1900 - Czech composer Zdenek Fibich, 49, in Prague

• 1964 - American composer Cole Porter, 73, in Santa Monica, California

Premieres

• 1780 - Haydn: opera La Fedelta Premiata, at Esterházy

• 1886 - Mussorgsky: A Night on Bald Mountain, posthumously, in a re-orchestration by Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov, in St. Petersburg, by the Russian Symphony conducted by Rimsky-Korsakov (Gregorian date: Oct. 27)

• 1886 - Dvorák: oratorio St. Ludmilla, at the Leeds Festival in England

• 1905 - Debussy: La Mer, at a Lamoureux Concert in Paris, conducted by Chevillard

• 1933 - Shostakovich: Piano Concerto No. 1, by the Leningrad Philharmonic conducted by Fritz Stiedry, with the composer as piano soloist, and the trumpet solos played by Alexander Shmidt

• 1938 - R. Strauss: opera, Daphne, in Dresden at the State Opera, karl Boehm conducting, with vocal soloists Margarete Teschemacher (Daphne), Torsten Ralf (Apollo), Helena Jung (Gaea), and Martin Kremer (Leukippos)

• 1943 - Britten: Serenade for tenor, horn, and strings, in London

• 1943 - Lukas Foss: The Prairie, by the Boston Symphony, Serge Koussevitzky conducting

• 1946 - first concert performance of Britten: Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra (Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Henry Purcell), in Liverpool. This music was written for the education film The Instruments of the Orchestra, which was first shown on November 29, 1946

• 1955 - Xenakis: Metastasis for 61 instruments, in Donaueschingen, Germany

• 1981 - Robert Starer: Violin Concerto, by the Boston Symphony, Seiji Ozawa conducting, with Itzhak Perlman as soloist

• 1985 - Christopher Rouse: Lares Hercii for violin and harpsichord, in Rochester, N.Y., by Charles Castleman (violin) and Arthur Haas (harpsichord)

• 1988 - Conlon Nancarrow: String Quartet No. 3, in Cologne, Germany, by the Arditti Quartet

• 1997 - Peter Maxwell Davies: The Jacobite Rising, in Glasgow, with the composer conducting soloists and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and Chorus

• 2003 - Peter Maxwell Davies: Naxos Quartet No. 3, at Wigmore Hall, London, by the Maggini Quartet

Others

• 1738 - London music publisher John Walsh the younger issues Handel’s Organ Concertos (see Julian date: Oct. 4)

• 1739 - Handel completes his Concerto Grosso No. 6 (Gregorian date: Oct. 26)

• 1739 - Handel completes his Concerto Grosso No. 2 (see Julian date: Oct. 4)

• 1844 - Johann Strauss, Jr., 18, conducts his own orchestra for the first time, at Dommayer's Casino in Hietzing (just outside Vienna)

• 1956 - Leonard Bernstein named co-principal conductor of the New York Philharmonic (with Dimitri Mitropoulos).