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God & Dances


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Mary-Victoria Voutsas full profile / Piano solo / 1 musician


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Manos Hadtzidakis (Μάνος Χατζιδάκης)
02 For A Little White Seashell Op. 1 No. 1-10
1. March
2. Syrtos
3. ConversationwithSergeiProkofiev 4. Tsamikos
5. Mantinada
6. Ballos
7. Nocturne
8. Kalamatianos
9. Pastorale
10.Big Sousta

Antonin Dvorak
03 Poetic Tone Pictures, Op. 85
No. 8 Goblin Dance No. 10 Bacchanale

Franz Liszt
04 Années de pèlerinage: Deuxième année, S. 161 No. 5 Sonetto 123 del Petrarca
05 Harmonies poétiques et religieuses, S. 173:
No. 7 Funérailles
No. 8 Miserere, d’après Palestrina
06 Late Works
Unstern! Sinistre, disastro, S. 208

In festo transigurationis Domini nostri Jesu Christi, S. 188

Dimitri Kabalevsky
07 Rondo Op. 59


Historical context

Hatzidakis believed in “the song that reveals and expresses us from within and does not flatter the hasty and violently forced-upon-us habits” and felt “contempt for those who do not aim for reassessment and spiritual youth, those easily recognized politicians and artists, dark and shady journalism and every form of vulgarity”.
Hadtzidakis shunned fame, he never did things the “accepted” way and was more often in the spotlight for his outspoken stance on anything and everything than his riveting music. He was a visionary. Deeply political, his contribution to Greek art and music is inestimable. He was often attacked by “socialist” press for revealing what’s behind politically guided culture. He led the national broadcaster’s Trito Programma into the 21st century and made ERT the experimental ground for fresh offerings,
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leaving the state-run broadcaster a legacy that has changed very little since his time.
He brought music and culture to the people of both populated and rural Greece. He published the cultural magazine To Tetarto all about the politics of art and the art of politics. He formed independent label Sirius, which to this day – run by his son – works for (and not against) culture with serious efforts in music. The Orchestra of Colors (Orchestra ton Chromaton) is his brainchild, presenting works rarely performed. And his 1949 lecture on the rebetiko has remained a landmark in music history establishing its role as an independent genre.
Behind the guise of what many described as obstinacy was a man of firm beliefs and ideals, of dreams and desires, of passions and weaknesses. He was deeply political. His greatness? Admittance and acceptance – both the result of a tedious inner battle, changing the things one can, accepting the things one can’t, and knowing the difference.
In 1985, Hadtzidakis took to the streets to voice his anger for the murder of 15-year-old Michalis Kaltezas by police during the Polytechnic events, and again when an “anarchist” teen was being held at Korydallos prison. When Greece joined the EU, he equated it to modern slavery.
In remembrance and grounding of his beliefs, let him speak for himself: “There is no end to whatever has happened, to whatever happens and to what the future brings. Perhaps one day I will return for all that is still to happen...”

Dvorak composed the complete cycle in the spring of 1889 in less than two months. The end of the 1880s was a period when the composer often returned to the time of his youth, and a number of his works from that era have a nostalgic, old-worldly air about them. The composer, in fact, stressed this aspect of his new work in a letter to his publisher, where he states that he was seeking to create musical poetry as Schumann would have done, even if the pieces “do not sound Schumannesque”. The individual parts of the cycle thus merely evoke a general mood, and the names are to suggest to the listener a certain scope of ideas. The thirteen parts bring a rich palette of various different moods, from the romantic and dream-like, to stylisations of a wild and furious dance.

Having recently traveled to many new countries, through different settings and places consecrated by history and poetry; having felt that the phenomena of nature and their attendant sights did not pass before my eyes as pointless images but stirred deep emotions in my soul, and that between us a vague but immediate relationship had established itself, an undefined but real rapport, an inexplicable but undeniable communication, I have tried to portray in music a few of my strongest sensations and most lively impressions.”
Sonnet:
On earth reveal'd the beauties of the skies, Angelic features, it was mine to hail;
Features, which wake my mingled joy and wail, While all besides like dreams or shadows flies. And fill'd with tears I saw those two bright eyes, Which oft have turn'd the sun with envy pale; And from those lips I heard—oh! such a tale, As might awake brute Nature's sympathies!
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Wit, pity, excellence, and grief, and love
With blended plaint so sweet a concert made,
As ne'er was given to mortal ear to prove:
And heaven itself such mute attention paid,
That not a breath disturb'd the listening grove— Even æther's wildest gales the tuneful charm obey'd.
05 Harmonies poétiques et religieuses, S. 173:
Collection is prefaced: There are some meditative souls that solitude and contemplation raise inevitably towards ideas that are infinite, that is towards religion; all their thoughts are converted into enthusiasm and prayer, all their existence is a mute hymn to the Divine and to hope. They seek in themselves and in the creation that surrounds them steps to climb to God, expressions and images to reveal him to them, and to reveal themselves to him: I would that I could lend them some of these! There are hearts broken by sorrow, held back by the world, who take refuge in the world of their thoughts, in solitude of soul, to weep, to wait or to worship; I would that they might be visited by a muse solitary like them, to find sympathy in her harmonies and to say sometimes, as they listen: We pray with your words, we weep with your tears, we call on God with your songs!"
No. 7 Funérailles
From a cycle of 10 pieces called Harmonies poétiques et religieuses (Poetic and Religious Harmonies), Liszt’s Funerailles is without a doubt the most well-known of the set, and one of his most famous pieces. This may be largely owing to a middle section which exhibits one of the more hair-raising and exhilarating (and/or disastrous) technical challenges in the piano repertoire: a thunderous tumult of left hand octaves in ceaseless ostinato patterns. Subtitled “October 1849,” it is thought to have been written with the memory of three men in mind, all who died in the Hungarian uprising against the Hapsburgs in the previous year. Some have conjectured Liszt experienced a deep personal trauma because of their deaths and
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the failure of the uprising (it is worth noting he was himself one of the most famous Hungarians of all time). Others have cited Chopin as an inspiration for the work—Chopin was a friend of Liszt, and died only months before the work was written. It is also well-known that the famous octave section previously mentioned was, by Liszt’s own admission, lifted from Chopin’s “Heroic” Polonaise (and in the hands of the Hungarian, made even more difficult). In any case, Funerailles is a mournful, tearful, yet (like the Polonaise) heroic work—the opening pages have been equated to the distant ringing of church bells across a battlefield—a battlefield which has become a gravesite. This enormous, relentless ringing (A section) builds and builds to a thundering climax which is suddenly interrupted by what I feel must surely be trumpet calls, signaling the beginning of the funeral procession. The procession begins (B section)—a mournful dirge with a drooping, heavy left hand melody and right hand chords which never alleviate an almost suffocating tension. This death march again builds to a climax which is subverted and brought to a total stop before the third section, which is of an entirely different character. A-flat, (for Liszt, the key which signifies love) is introduced, enveloping a luminous melody, marked lagrimosa (tearfully). The melody seems tentative at first, but is soon more expressive—I find the music here to be incredibly beautiful and evocative, if extremely sad. It is possible to project on this section, in light of what is known of Funerailles, a memory—perhaps even one which did not take place—of an intimate dialogue between two people who would have been together for a long time, were it not for an unpredicted tragedy. This tender, fragile dream becomes a passionate duet, written in classic Lisztian style, with octaves and chords abounding. Again rising to a climax—this time intense and impassioned—the music stops short of the expected cadence, and slowly the left hand begins a repeating ostinato figure deep in the bass register of the piano which signals the approach of something undaunted and heroic. The right hand enters with unstoppable martial chords. As you will hear (hopefully), the single-note ostinato in the left hand becomes a rumbling roar of octaves, relentlessly surging back and forth in the bass
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under the increasingly excited right hand—we have entered the famous octaves section. After a pummeling up the keyboard, the funeral procession will re-enter, doubled in its furious, hell-bent energy; the heroism of the octaves is swallowed up. But the grieving procession does not get the last word; interestingly, Liszt gives us one last glimpse of the beautiful “love” melody, and then makes an exit which contains music you will most certainly recognize.
No. 8 Miserere, d’après Palestrina
The melody is based on a motet Liszt heard at the Sistine Chapel. It does have a
feeling of Paestrina's style in the melody, but no style of Palestrina in the keyboard
gyrations of the accompaniment. Included in the simple initial statement of the
melody Liszt has included the Latin text of the Miserere. The English translation:
God have mercy on me according to your great merciful heart and according to your compassion remove my anxiety
06 Late Works
Unstern! Sinistre, disastro, S. 208
Unstern! (‘Unlucky’, or ‘Evil Star’) contains some brutally unfriendly harmony, with its open tritones, whole-tone harmony, augmented triads over a pedal and violent dissonance before the organ-like closing section brings a measure of peace, if no final balm. Small wonder that Liszt spoke of his musical language not being understood in his lifetime! In three languages, the title means Dark Star: Sinister, Disastrous. Liszt's last period contains several works which are among the most advanced and radical music anyone had written to that point, not excluding that of Liszt's son-in-law, Richard Wagner. The dissonances of this darkly glittering piece are remarkable. An unwary listener would be apt to place them among the works of the twentieth century's most important innovators. The dissonances are practically unresolved; the tension is continuous. Before Debussy, Liszt employs the whole tone scale harmonically, to produce a series of augmented triads. Both the scale
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and this sort of harmony open many possibilities. At the end, organ-like sonorities portray the prayers of a terrified humanity.
In festo transigurationis Domini nostri Jesu Christi, S. 188
Franz Liszt held deeply religious convictions even though his early personal life often contradicted them. Later in life, however, after the death of both his son Daniel and daughter Blandine, Liszt retreated in sadness to the monastery Madonna del Rosario, just outside of Rome in June 1863. He had already joined the Franciscan order in 1857 and in his later years was occasionally referred to as Abbé Liszt. Many of his works after this time began to include elements of mysticism, if not wholly embracing a higher spiritual meaning. Composed in 1880, In festo transfigurationis Domini nostri Jesu Christi (“On the Feast of the Transfiguration of Our Lord Jesus Christ”) is a brief piece for piano. The compositions from Liszt’s last years were marked by an almost severe economy, devoid of the flashy virtuosic pianism upon which his reputation as both a performer and composer had been built. These works Liszt also composed for himself and he used this freedom to indulge in experimentation.
Dimitri Kabalevsky
07 Rondo Op. 59
Written in 1958, “Rondo in a Minor Op.59”, is a piano piece for the Tchaikovsky Piano Competition by Kabalevsky against the background of the Second World War and using folk music as material. The musical composition is known for its “fiery emotions, gorgeous prestos, melodies as beautiful as songs, and rich and colorful harmony.” Based on his life experience and creative style, as well as the creative background of the work, this thesis explores and analyzes the performance skills of the musical composition. Kabalevsky was not concerned with musical technicalities but with the emotional climate of Soviet music, its topicality, its relationship to the contemporary Socialist viewpoint. He spoke against the “exaggerated idea of the
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importance of tragedy” and criticized the young composers who, without having experienced tragedy, produced “falsely tragic” works. An exception was Shostakovich “whose really tragic and amazingly powerful symphonies” reflect the “actual tragic conflicts of our time”. But in general, Kabalevsky stated clearly that “tragedy is not the sphere of art adapted to the main features that are characteristic of our country’s life and of the spirit of our people”. Among the characteristic features he lists, first of all, strength—“the strength of ideological conviction, of intellect, feeling, and will.” In second place comes optimism—“the firm belief in the future and revolutionary aspiration . . . born of the Socialist outlook”. Kabalevsky’s thesis, his warning against the over-emphasis of tragedy, was directed primarily towards the younger composers. Kabalevsky was careful to assure us that “no limits are set to Socialist realistic art”. But he qualifies the statement immediately by saying, “The people expect us to give them, first and foremost, works that are connected with the image of the contemporary man, his rich inner life, and clear optimistic outlook on the future.” Of course, he means the Soviet man, in the “ideal human society—Communism”.


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