Mykola Kolessa, who recently celebrated his ninety-sixth birthday, is a

father figure among living Ukrainian composers. A conductor and

pedagogue as well as a composer, he was honored with the title of

People’s Artist of the Ukraine, membership in the Academy of Arts of

the Ukraine, the Taras Shevechenko State Prize, and an emeritus 

professorship at the Lysenko Musical Academy in Lyiv. Kolessa studied 

composition under Vitezslav Novak, a pupil of Dvorak. Kolessa’s

musical style combines the unique elements of Ukrainian folk music and

the compositional techniques of Bela Bartok and the French composers 

of the first half of the twentieth century. The title for the second prelude,

Hutsulian, honors the Hutsuls, a Ukrainian mountain people.

Sigismond Thalberg (1812-1871) was Franz Liszt’s only rival as a

pianist. Their musical “duel” in 1837 in Paris drew considerable 

attention. Although he lost the competition, Thalberg continued to build

his reputation as one of the greatest nineteenth-century piano virtuosos.

He toured the United States in 1856, only the second European pianist to

do so (Henri Herz, 1803-1888, was the first). Using popular operas as

the basis for extended piano solo fantasies {Moses in Egypt is one of

Rossini’s operas), Thalberg brought to the art of piano playing the same

kind of emotional intensity that the great singers of his time aroused.

Liszt’s Sonata in B Minor was dedicated to Robert Schumann, in return

for his dedication to Liszt of his well-known C Major Fantasy. The

sonata contained so many daring innovations that many who attended the

first performance could not endure it to the end. The work has been

characterized by some critics as technically self-defeating and

sophisticated to the point of vagueness, but it is nevertheless 

acknowledged by pianists as a monumental work of prophetic cleverness 

and intellect. The visionary coda, with its bells tolling in the distance, 

brings the sonata to a mystical close that calls to mind Liszt’s lifelong

vacillation between the secular and spiritual emotional worlds.

Program notes by Elmer Booze

The Fifty-ninth Season of

THE WILLIAM NELSON CROMWELL and

F. LAMMOT BELIN CONCERTS

National Gallery of Art

2377th Concert

MYKOLA SUK, pianist

Sunday Evening, 18 March 2001

Seven O'clock

West Building, West Garden Court

Admission free
Joseph Haydn

(1732-1809)

PROGRAM

Sonata in E-Flat Major

Hob. XVI: 49 (1789-1790)

Allegro con brio

Adagio e cantabile

Finale: Tempo di minuet

Mykola Kolessa Two Preludes

(b. 1903)

Autumnal

Hutsulian

Washington premiere performance

Sigismond Thalberg Fantasy on “Moses in Egypt,” Op. 33

(1812-1871)

INTERMISSION

Franz Liszt

(1811-1886)

Sonata in B Minor

Lento assai; allegro energico

Andante sostenuto; allegro energico

Stretta quasi presto; allegro moderato

(Movements played without pause)

The use ofcameras or recording equipment during

the performance is not allowed.

For the convenience ofconcertgoers

the Garden Cafe remains open until 6:30 p.m.

Two of the numerous enthusiastic reviews that Ukrainian pianist Mykola

Suk has received were written after his performance of the Liszt Dante

Sonata at the Franz Liszt Festival in Hamilton, Ontario: “It was some of

the finest Liszt playing I have ever heard....He will surely prove to be

one of the more formidable talents to have appeared in this country in

years” (John C. Tibbett, American Record Guide); “Indeed, I have

seldom heard Liszt playing in which such an impressive technique was

so completely subsumed in the task of musical characterization”

(William Littler, The Toronto Star). Mykola Suk gained international 

recognition as the winner of the first prize and the gold medal at the 1971

International Liszt-Bartok Competition in Budapest. Since then he has

concertized to great acclaim both as soloist and chamber musician

throughout the former USSR, in North America, Australia, Europe, and

the Middle East. He has premiered a number of concertos and solo works

by Ukrainian composers, including Valentin Silvestrov, Ivan Karabyts,

and Myroslav Skoryk. Bom in Kiev into a family of musicians, Suk has

been awarded the title of Outstanding Artist of the Ukraine. Formerly on

the faculty of the Kiev and Moscow Conservatories, he currently teaches

at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston and is an artist-in

residence and director of the Institute Series for the Ukrainian Institute of

America. Mykola Suk has recorded for the Melodya, Russian Disc,

Hungaraton, and Melda labels, and appears at the National Gallery by

arrangement with Shupp Artists Management, Inc., of Port Jefferson, 

New York.

Haydn’s Sonata in E-flat Major has been dubbed “Genzinger,” as it

was purportedly written for Marianne Genzinger, the wife of Peter L. von

Genzinger, a prosperous Viennese physician. Her extended 

correspondence with Haydn gave him great pleasure, and she is believed 

to have been a motivating force behind his eventual move from the

Esterhazy estate to Vienna. The second movement of the sonata {Adagio

cantabile) is the heart of the work, projecting soulful joy. Haydn wrote to

Marianne Genzinger that this movement had “deep significance,” and

intimated that he desired to perform it for her when the opportunity 

presented itself.