in search of the wild encore
Oct. 5th, 2010 04:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
calimacPerhaps the most challenging part of writing classical music reviews professionally is identifying encores. A good professional review should do that whenever possible. Sometimes they're announced from the stage; sometimes not. Sometimes you can make out what the performer is saying; sometimes not. Sometimes you already know the piece; sometimes not. If not, it helps to have good reference sources and to be able to keep the piece firmly in mind until you can consult them.
I'm not always the best contestant at "name that tune." Once I reviewed a visiting orchestra which played two encores. I recognized both pieces, but couldn't remember which ones they were, and I couldn't get back to my record collection easily. I ended up calling the host orchestra's publicity department and asking them, and boy did I feel stupid when they told me.
Other times research is triumphant. Once a string quartet said they were playing a scherzo by Arriaga. I'd certainly heard of Arriaga, but I didn't know his quartets, yet I didn't feel my review would be complete unless I identified which quartet it came from. The next morning I checked that a local library had a CD of his three quartets, so I rushed over and checked it out to listen to the scherzi. It wasn't the First Quartet. It wasn't the Second. It was the Third.
At the orchestra concert I reviewed last week, the soloist played an unannounced encore which sounded to me like Ysäye or Wieniawski or someone of that ilk. It was the conductor who mentioned after intermission that it was a caprice by Wieniawski. A good start. On the violinist's web page I found a list of his repertoire. It included some of the Op. 18 waltz-caprices by Wieniawski and nothing else by that composer, so that gave me more identification. I didn't have time to check further.
At last weekend's concert, the encore was announced but I couldn't make out what was said. I managed to buttonhole the first violinist afterwards and ask him. He said it was a waltz by Dvořák, and I gathered it had originally been written for something else and arranged by the composer for string quartet. That was a start, but I thought I could go further. Could it perhaps be one of the large set of songs called Cypresses which Dvořák had arranged for quartet? Perhaps, but I thought if it were, the violinist would have said so. When I got home, I idly leafed through the Dvořák section of one of my most useful reference books, Barlow and Morgenstern's Dictionary of Musical Themes. Suddenly the main theme of the piece jumped out at my eye. (It's useful to be able to read music, though I don't read it very well.) It was a waltz in A for piano, Op. 54 No. 1. A quick check in one of my other most useful reference books, The Da Capo Catalog of Classical Music Compositions, confirmed that Dvořák had arranged the piece for string quartet in 1880, and my research was complete. And now so is the review.
I'm not always the best contestant at "name that tune." Once I reviewed a visiting orchestra which played two encores. I recognized both pieces, but couldn't remember which ones they were, and I couldn't get back to my record collection easily. I ended up calling the host orchestra's publicity department and asking them, and boy did I feel stupid when they told me.
Other times research is triumphant. Once a string quartet said they were playing a scherzo by Arriaga. I'd certainly heard of Arriaga, but I didn't know his quartets, yet I didn't feel my review would be complete unless I identified which quartet it came from. The next morning I checked that a local library had a CD of his three quartets, so I rushed over and checked it out to listen to the scherzi. It wasn't the First Quartet. It wasn't the Second. It was the Third.
At the orchestra concert I reviewed last week, the soloist played an unannounced encore which sounded to me like Ysäye or Wieniawski or someone of that ilk. It was the conductor who mentioned after intermission that it was a caprice by Wieniawski. A good start. On the violinist's web page I found a list of his repertoire. It included some of the Op. 18 waltz-caprices by Wieniawski and nothing else by that composer, so that gave me more identification. I didn't have time to check further.
At last weekend's concert, the encore was announced but I couldn't make out what was said. I managed to buttonhole the first violinist afterwards and ask him. He said it was a waltz by Dvořák, and I gathered it had originally been written for something else and arranged by the composer for string quartet. That was a start, but I thought I could go further. Could it perhaps be one of the large set of songs called Cypresses which Dvořák had arranged for quartet? Perhaps, but I thought if it were, the violinist would have said so. When I got home, I idly leafed through the Dvořák section of one of my most useful reference books, Barlow and Morgenstern's Dictionary of Musical Themes. Suddenly the main theme of the piece jumped out at my eye. (It's useful to be able to read music, though I don't read it very well.) It was a waltz in A for piano, Op. 54 No. 1. A quick check in one of my other most useful reference books, The Da Capo Catalog of Classical Music Compositions, confirmed that Dvořák had arranged the piece for string quartet in 1880, and my research was complete. And now so is the review.
