6/15 – Music of Enesco, Defaye, Françaix, Honegger, and Ibert

The first piece chosen by the Fulcrum Point brass players was composed for an examination at the Paris Conservatory.  Arthur Honegger (1892-1955) graduated from the Paris Conservatory in 1918 and went on to become part of a loosely-affiliated group called The Six: young composers active in Paris during the 1920s who rebelled against musical Romanticism and often fused classical-music traditions with new sounds from the worlds of jazz and pop. The “Intrada” was written for the conservatory’s trumpet examination of 1947.  Stephen Burns devised tonight’s arrangement for trumpet, trombone, horn, and piano. Intrada means entrance; in musical terms, it would be a fanfare-like piece to usher in the guest of honor, or for the musicians to play as they marched to their places at the front of the audience. This particular Intrada is in three brief sections, the first marked Maestoso (Majestic) and featuring viruoso themes in the instruments’ upper registers. The middle section is more like a dance; its tempo marking is Allegro, Lively, and it shows Honegger’s fondness for propulsive rhythm. The final section is a reprise of the opening.

French composer Jean-Michel Defaye, born in 1932, has been influenced by 12-tone composition, a method devised in the early 20th century by Arnold Schoenberg in which all 12 notes of the chromatic scale are treated with equal importance. A piece in C Major usually begins and ends on that note, and its chords and harmonies are based on C.  A 12-tone piece, by contrast, does not have that kind of tonal “center.” Defaye’s “Mouvement” originated as a trombone examination piece for the Paris Conservatory in 1972. It’s a single movement in five sections, each of which has particular challenges for the soloist. The full range of the trombone is explored, and the player must negotiate wide intervallic leaps: going immediately from a very low note to a very high one, for example.

Georges Enesco lived from 1881 to 1955; he was born in Romania, and many of his works, like the famous “Romanian Rhapsodies,” explore the folksongs and dances of that country. He lived mostly in Paris and had parallel careers as a composer, violinist, and conductor. In addition to Romanian folk music, a major influence on his style was the Impressionistic music of Debussy. “Legende” was written for the Paris Conservatory’s 1906 trumpet examinations. Its opening section allows the trumpet to soar with lyrical melodies. In contrast, the middle section requires more virtuoso playing, with lots of colorful runs up and down the instrument’s range. The final section is a varied repeat of the quiet opening.

The Italian word is Divertimento; in French, Divertissement; in English, Entertainment. Jean Françaix (1912-1997) was fond of this title and used it for several pieces. His three-movement Divertimento for horn and piano dates from 1959. Hornist Gregory Flint contributes this commentary: “The short first movement, Introduction, presents playful variations of light-hearted melody, ending with a brief solo cadenza for the horn. This leads into a sentimental Aria, further marked Cantabile, singing, that never quite settles down. The third movement, Canzonetta, or Little Song, is a raucous circus march that contains several jazz stylings and humorous jazzy riffs for both players.”

Our concert ends with a brief “Impromptu” by Jacques Ibert (1890-1962), originally for trumpet and piano but arranged by Stephen Burns for trumpet, trombone, horn, and piano. Written in 1950, it’s jazzy and tuneful and sounds like a kind of improvisation; the word impromptu designates a piece that’s written down but sounds as if the performer is improvising on the spur of the moment. It makes a very fun and upbeat conclusion for Fulcrum Point’s sampling of French brass music.