pays homage to the classical tradition as well as to Beethoven, whose

cello sonatas were Brahms’ model. The sonata closes successfully with

unrelenting drive at the coda, which is marked piu presto.

Programs notes by Elmer Booze

Concerts at the National Gallery of Art

Under the direction ofGeorge Memos

January 2003

January

5 National Gallery Orchestra

George Manos, conductor

12 Gary Graffman, pianist

19 The Verdehr Trio

Walter Verdehr, violin

Elsa Ludwig Verdehr,

clarinet

Sylvia Roederer, piano

26 The Thomas Zehetmair

Quartet

Gala Viennese New Year Concert

Reinicke: Sonata, Opus 179

Von Sauer: Waldandacht

Chopin/Godowsky: Etudes

J. S. Bach/Brahms: Chaconne in

D Minor

Reger: Four Etudes

Blumenfeld: Etude, Opus 36

Mozart: Trio, K. 358

Fanny Mendelssohn: Romance

Armand Russell: Romance

Tchaikovsky: Entr'acte from

Sleeping Beauty

Joan Tower: Rainwaves

Bright Sheng: Reflections, Tibetan

Dance

Schumann: String Quartet No. 1

Cage: String Quartet in Four Parts

Bartok: String Quartet No. 5

The Sixty-first Season of

THE WILLIAM NELSON CROMWELL and

F. LAMMOT BELIN CONCERTS

National Gallery of Art

2440th Concert

LUIGI PIOVANO, cellist

LUISA PRAYER, pianist

Sunday Evening, 29 December 2002

Seven O’clock

West Building, West Garden Court

Admission free
Program

Camille Saint-Saens Sonata No. 1 in C Minor

(1835-1921) Op. 32 (1872)

Allegro

Andante tranquillo sostenuto

Allegro moderato

Robert Schumann

(1810-1856)

Adagio and Allegro in A-flat Major

Op. 70 (1849)

Intermission

Guiseppe Martucci

(1856-1909)

Two Romances for Cello and Piano

Op. 72 (1891)

No. 1 in A Minor

No. 2 in A Major

Johannes Brahms

(1833-1897)

Sonata No. 1 in E Minor

Op. 38 (1862-1865)

Allegro non troppo

Allegretto quasi minuetto

Allegro

The use of cameras or recording equipment during

the performance is not allowed. Please be 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.

Musicians

Born in 1969 in Pescara, Italy, Luigi Piovano began piano studies at age

five under the guidance of his father. He turned to the cello a few years

later, and in his early teens studied under the renowned Romanian cellist

Radu Aldulescu. As a scholarship student at the International Menuhin

Academy in Gstaad, Switzerland, and as soloist with Yehudi Menuhin’s

chamber orchestra, Camerata Lysy, Piovano concertized internationally

between 1989 and 1992. Since 1999 he has participated in the Menuhin

Festival in Gstaad and the Newport Festival in Rhode Island. Piovano is

a member of the Quartetto Michelangelo, which won first prize at the

Concours Internationale de Musique de Chambre at Illzach, France. At

the invitation of Maurizio Pollini, he participated in the Progetto Pollini,

undertaken in 2002 in both New York and Salzburg, Austria. Among the

internationally known musicians with whom Luigi Piovano has

performed are Wolfgang Sawallisch, Myung Wha Chung, and Katia and

Marielle Lebeque. Luigi Piovano records for the Vermeer, EMI, Nuova

Era, and Opus 111 labels. He is first cello soloist of the Orchestra of the

National Academy of Santa Cecilia. He performs alternately on two

historic cellos, a Guiseppe Scarbi, dated 1868, and an Arturo Fracassi,

dated 1935.

Pianist Luisa Prayer is one of Italy’s most sought-after chamber 

musicians. A professor of chamber music at the Conservatory of

L'Aquila, she founded and administers the international music festival,

Pietre Che Cantano, in Ocre, Italy. A native of Rome, she studied at the

Santa Cecilia Conservatory under Sergio Cafaro, graduating in 1982. In

1984 she won an Austrian state scholarship, allowing her to attend the

Mozarteum in Salzburg, from which she received the master diploma 

under the tutelage of Gilbert Schuchter. Prayer has also attended 

Reccardo Brengola’s chamber music master classes, both at the

Accademia Chigiana in Siena and at the National Academy of Santa

Cecilia, where she earned the diploma with highest honors. She has

performed at music festivals in Kerkrade, Holland; Sermoneta and

Portogruaro, Italy; and Okinawa, Japan. She has made recordings and

participated in broadcasts in Italy, Germany, Austria, and Taiwan.
Program Notes

Camille Saint-Saens’ Sonata No. 1 in C Minor for Cello and Piano, Op.

32, presents contrasting textures and kaleidoscopic moods that are not

usually associated with his music. His works are generally characterized 

as overtly delicate, capricious, sophisticated, technically demanding, and

possessing a charismatic line and insightful transparency. This sonata,

however, was written during the time of the Franco-Prussian War (1870—

1871), when Saint-Saens lost several intimate friends who had either 

died as prisoners of war or had been outright casualties. He also lost a

beloved aunt. The experience took a toll on him both physically and

emotionally.

While both of the outer movements are shrouded in heroic

ambience, the inner movement is a much needed respite, especially after

the turmoil of the explosive opening segment of the sonata. Following

the format of the sonata-allegro form, the first movement (Allegro)

begins forcefully, with the cello and piano playing in unison. When the

first and second themes make their appearance, they begin with fierce

and incisive elements of a foreboding nature that could be construed as

symbols of military conscription. The themes are moderated with

passages of introspective tranquility. In opposition to the dramatic 

turbulence of the first movement, the second (Andante tranquillo

sostennto) is shorter in length, non-agitated, and much more tuneful,

settling on a moment of reflective yearning and divine inspiration. The

third movement (Allegro moderato) commences with a broad echoing

dialogue between piano and cello that is followed by an unexpected

palpitating, rhythmic motif of meteoric drive. Pushed to its limits, the

underlining figure develops into a romantic canvas of emotion that

continues to the end of the movement, where a brilliant coda closes the

work triumphantly.

Schumann wrote his Adagio and Allegro, Op. 70, initially for

horn and piano, while at the same time providing an alternate part for

violin or cello. The work is filled with a great romantic sweep that loses

very little in transcription. Spread out in three epigrammatic movements,

the work epitomizes the sum and substance of the romantic era. The

opening Adagio plays forth with a honeyed, liquid melody. A thespian

march section follows. After a brief interlude, the work concludes with

an effervescent Allegro.

The Due Romanze (Two Romances) of Giuseppe Martucci are his

last compositions for this genre. In their short delivery, these two pieces

personify Martucci’s highly imaginative and lyrical nature. The first

Romance is in the key of A minor and is likened by some writers to the

compositional style of Schubert, particularly in the effortlessness of its

delivery. The second, in the key of A major, has a melodious line, spiced

with a cameo expression of sadness that remains unchanged, even when

it moves through moments of heated passion.

Brahms intended his first cello sonata to be a work in four

movements, but between its beginning (1862 in Munster) and its

completion (1865 in Lichtental), he had completely reworked it and

expunged the third movement (Adagio). Dedicated to his close friend

Josef Gansbacher (1829-1911), a cellist and teacher of singing, the

sonata had its premiere in 1874 at the hands of the AustroCzechoslovakian cellist and composer David Popper (1843-1913) and

the Viennese pianist Anton Door (1833-1919). Even at the age of

twenty-nine, Brahms demonstrated his penchant for writing in a richly

dark and somber manner, maintaining an elegiac sentiment throughout its

three movements and using the full range of colors provided by the lower

range of both the cello and the piano.

Demonstrating his commitment to the classical format for this

sonata, Brahms begins with a contemplative theme that soon gives way

to some dramatic impulses before relinquishing its drive to the second

theme. The latter brightens the darkened atmosphere, but only briefly.

There is a rigorous developmental workout of the two themes with the

obligatory return of the opening section (recapitulation) to end the

movement. The second movement (.Allegretto quasi minuetto) is a kind

of enhanced minuet with a trio, the theme of which is derived from the

first movement’s opening section (exposition). The finale (Allegro) is an

elaborate three-themed fugue in a form known as strict triple fugue. It