Edvard Grieg’s Sonata in A Minorfor Cello and Piano, Op. 36, is

dedicated to his brother John, who was an accomplished cellist and with

whom he performed in numerous concerts. It is claimed that John aided

Edvard in overcoming the difficulties in writing for the instrument. The

first movement (Allegro agitato), written in the sonata-allegro format, is

cast in a dark hue, reflecting a disconsolate but impassioned Nordic

mood. The main theme, stated by the cello, is bold and forceful, while

the second is calmer and more melodious. The lengthy but exhilarating 

development section concludes with the ushering in of a dynamic coda

that is marked presto, followed by prestissimo. The second movement

(.Andante molto tranquillo) projects a mood of placidity, with a melody

that found its way into the Triumphal March of Grieg’s King Sigurd

Jorsalfar Suite for Orchestra. Noteworthy as well are the colorful 

chromatic harmonies that Grieg had become adept at using. The third

movement {Allegro molto e marcato) opens with brief introduction by the

cello in solo, imitating the flute of a shepherd. The Norwegian peasant

dance tune that follows becomes the main theme for the movement. The

kaleidoscopic key changes, particularly in the development section, the

rambunctious interplay between the cello and the piano, and its strong

nationalistic sense make this movement “one of the very best and strongest 

in the whole of Grieg’s output. [ItJ fascinates by its imaginative wealth

[that is] always kept within the bounds of genuine organic unity, thanks to

a real sense of thematic development” (Harry Halbreich).

Programs notes by Elmer Booze

The Sixty-first Season of

THE WILLIAM NELSON CROMWELL and

F. LAMMOT BELIN CONCERTS

National Gallery of Art

2456th Concert

ZUILL BAILEY, cellist

J. Y. SONG, pianist

Sunday Evening, 27 April 2003

Seven O’clock

West Building, West Garden Court

Admission free
Program

Francois Francoeur 

(1698-1787)

Sonata in E Major for Cello and Piano

(c. 1730)

Adagio cantabile

Allegro vivo

Tempo di gavotta

Largo cantabile

Gigue: Allegro vivace

Felix Mendelssohn

(1809-1847)

Variations concertantes 

Op. 17 (1829)

Philip Lasser

(b. 1963)

Sonata for Solo for Cello and Piano

Introduction

Serenely Calm

Allegro molto

World Premiere Performance

Intermission

Edvard Grieg

(1843-1907)

Sonata in A Major, Op. 36

(1883)

Allegro agitato

Andante molto tranquillo

Allegro molto e marcato

The use of cameras or recording equipment during

the performance is not allowed. Please he sure that cell

phones, pagers, and other electronic devices are turned off.

For the convenience of concertgoers

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

The Musicians

Cellist Zuill Bailey is an engaging, multifaceted American artist, a

powerful performer who dazzles audiences with his technical and artistic

command of the cello. His performances encompass concerts with

orchestra, recitals, and chamber music. A native of Virginia, he

developed his passion for the cello at the age of four and gave his

concerto debut at age thirteen with the Prince William Symphony

Orchestra. A graduate of the Peabody Conservatory and the Juilliard

School of Music, Bailey’s principal teachers have been Loran 

Stephenson, the late Stephen Kates, and Joel Krosnick, cellist of the

Juilliard String Quartet. Bailey has performed frequently at the

Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Kennedy Center, the

Kravis Center in Palm Beach, Florida, and Wolf Trap Farm Park for the

Performing Arts in Virginia, where he has appeared in concert with the

Perlman/Nikkanen/Bailey Piano Trio. He has also been featured in the

summer festivals of Chautauqua, playing Victor Herbert’s Cello

Concerto No. 2, and at San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara’s Musical

Academy of the West, Rutgers University, and the Music Festival of the

Hamptons in Easthampton with Lucas Foss. Other activities include

revisiting his role as a murderous cellist in new segments being filmed

for HBO’s television series OZ. Zuill Bailey plays a 1693 Matteo

Goffriller cello, formally owned by Mischa Schneider of the Budapest

String Quartet.

Since her nomination as the 1994 ProPiano artist of the year and

her Alice Tully Hall recital debut in 1996, pianist j. y. song has

established herself as a musician with broad and idiosyncratic musical

tastes. Hailing her as a “world-class artist,” New York music critic Harris

Goldsmith noted her “truly astounding technical and imaginative

resources” and described her performances of Liszt and Haydn as

“tigerishly intense” and “exquisite.” She was born in Taiwan and raised

in Switzerland, where she studied at the Conservatoire de Geneve and the

Conservatoire de Lausanne. She later attended Stanford University,

graduating with distinction and honors with a bachelor of science degree

in microbiology and immunology as well as a bachelor of arts degree in
music. She received numerous music awards from Stanford, including

the Robert Golden Medal for excellence in performance and the

prestigious Sudler Prize for outstanding achievement in the creative arts.

She completed her doctoral studies at Juilliard under pianist Jerome

Lowenthal, has taught at the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music, and

recently joined the Hunter College faculty. Zuill Bailey and j. y. song

appear at the National Gallery by arrangement with Colbert Artists

Management, Inc., of New York City.

Program Notes

Composer and violinist Francois Francoeur is known less for the two sets

of violin and/or cello sonatas he composed than for his long and close

affiliation with the Opera of Paris, starting at age fifteen. Shortly after

commencing his association with the opera, Francoeur also became a

musician in the Parisian royal court, taking the titles of composer in the

royal chamber (1727-1756) and member of the chamber musicians to the

king (1744-1746). Francoeur wrote several operas and ballets, of which

only the operas survive, and the two sets of sonatas appear to be among his

few extant instrumental works. The E Major Sonata is not often heard in

its entirety, since it is a popular custom among cellists to program only

the third and fourth movements. Although there is a veiled undercurrent

of German and even Italian baroque influences in the work, the

unmistakable French element resides in the gavotte movement, which

presents a palpable display of subtlety and refinement. In addition to 

providing an example of the French exactitude in the employment of

melodic ornamentation, the sonata offers an emerging refinement of the

keyboard accompaniment, which was typically an unrealized basso

continuo line before Francoeur’s time.

Written in the year of his twentieth birthday, Mendelssohn’s

Variations concertantes, Op. 17, is considered a youthful effort, but

nonetheless accomplished. Indeed, it must be remembered that he was the

same young man who at age sixteen gave the world his Octet, Op. 20

(1825), and at seventeen his Overture to a Midsummer Night's Dream

(1826). Mendelssohn apparently wrote his Variations concertantes to be

performed by his younger brother Paul. It is an imposing work, full of

technical challenges for both the cello and piano. A theme with eight

variations, it opens with an extended introduction, followed by the theme

marked Andante con moto. Each subsequent variation is blazed in a

tempo that is quite breathless in its delivery. The tempo markings are as

follows: two prestissimi, followed by a piii vivace, allegro confuoco, and

Vistesso tempo. Variation six is designated fortissimo’, the seventh,

unrelenting in its power and speed, is posted as presto ed agitato.

Variation eight reiterates the opening theme but tags on a protracted coda

that is freely developed.

Philip Lasser is a member of the faculty of the Juilliard School of

Music in New York City. His works have been performed by the Seattle

Symphony, the String Orchestra of New York, Bacchanalia, the New

York Concert Singers, and the Whitman Quartet. He studied composition

at Fontainebleau and in Paris with Narcis Bonet, a close disciple of

Nadia Boulanger. His piano teacher was Gaby Casadesus. In 1989

Lasser collaborated with Casadesus on a book for concert pianists

entitled Ma technique quotidienne (My Daily Technique). He holds a

bachelor of arts degree, summa cum laude, from Harvard College, a

master of arts degree from Columbia University, and a doctor of musical

arts degree in composition from the Juilliard School, where he studied

with David Diamond. Lasser is president of the European-American

Musical Alliance, a not-for-profit arts organization that offers a summer

program taught in the Nadia Boulanger tradition to young American

composers at the historic Schola Cantorum in Paris, France.

Lasser’s Sonatafor Cello and Piano was commissioned in 2002 by 

Joan and Philip Krone for Zuill Bailey and receives its first public

performance in this concert. Cast in three movements, the work begins with

a meditative introduction, indicated in the score to be “murmured like a

prayer chant” yet “with moments of great expressivity.” In a general sense,

this struggle for serenity over passion is fought throughout the sonata. The

composer’s style comes out of his love for both the linear craft of Bach and

Brahms and the terse, syncretic, and mosaic structures found in Debussy. It

creates a bridge across the unexpectedly large chasm separating the linear

and syncretic approches to composition. Lasser views his compositions as

invitations to the listener to journey into a world that can only be explored

through the poetry of sound.