handling of the chordal writing for the strings, in addition to the

inclusion of the rhythmic and melodic structures found in Norwegian folkmusic.

The opening movement, Un poco andante; allegro molto edagitato

begins, after a somber introduction, with a theme that recurs several times in this quartet. The theme is not conventionally used;

there is no thematic development as found in the sonata-allegro

form. Instead, it is developed by means of extreme musical projections, such as sforzato and marcato.

Walter W Cobbett (1847—1937), English patron of music and

editor of Cobbetfs Cyclopedic Survey ofChamber Music, describes the

opening movement of the Grieg Quartet as “an elaborate mosaic,

but fresh and effective.” The second movement, Romanze:Andantino;

allegro agitato, is highly romantic and energetic, with a vacillating

tendency between the two. The third movement, Intermezzo: Allegro molto marcato, finds Grieg at his best in creating a nationalistic

style. There are strong rhythmic melodies stemming from Norwegian folk dances, which he loved. The movement is brilliant and

lusty. The finale, Lento; presto alsaltarello, with its beginning slow 

introduction, is focused on the saltarello, a sixteenth-century Italian dance that shifts from slow, fluid steps to lively jumping.

- Program notes by Elmer Booze

Concerts at the National Gallery of Art

Under the Direction of George Manos

November 1998

1 National Gallery Orchestra

George Manos, conductor

Kathryn Hearden, soprano

Beethoven: Coriolanus

Overture

Scene: ‘Ah,

perfido!”

Symphony No. 7

15 Kirill Gliadkovsky, pianist

22 National Gallery Orchestra

George Manos, conductor

Claudia Ghudacoff, violinist

Marcio Botelho, cellist

29 Joao Carlos Martins, pianist

December

6 Nai-Yuan Hu, violinist

Nelson Padgett, pianist

13 Mia Chung, pianist

dementi: Sonata, Op.2412

Beethoven: “Moonlight”

Sonata

Prokofiev: Sonata No. 3

Schumann: uBunte Blatter”

Symphonic

Etudes

Mozart: Don Giovanni

Overture

Symphony No. 35

Brahms: Concertofor

Violin, Cello, and

Orchestra

J. S. Bach: Ten Preludes

andFugues

from uThe

Well-tempered

Clavier”

Mozart: Sonata, K. 309

Sonata, K. 330

Mozart: Sonata, K. 311

R. Strauss: Sonata, Op. 18

Korngold:

MendelsMuch Ado About

Nothing, Op. 11

sohn: Sonata in FMajor

Beethoven: Seven Bagatelles

Sonata, Op. 110

Lee Hyla: Riffand Transfiguration

Chopin: FMinor Fantasy

The Fifty-seventh Season of

THE WILLIAM NELSON CROMWELL and

E LAMMOT BELIN CONCERTS

National Gallery of Art

2282nd Concert

ALCAN QUARTET

BRETT MOLZAN, violin NATHALIE CAMUS, violin

LUC BEAUCHEMIN, viola DAVID ELLIS, cello

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r— r- rmm mm gm

fl ? j i. yjf T

> i n

1 Hr J liJ K 11 1 I 1 1 fei 1

fH iJ . 'mmmti , U tUA

8 Mark Rush, violinist

Tannis Gibson, pianist

Beethoven:

Nicholas

Maw:

Prokofiev:

Sonata in G,

Op. 3013

Sonatafor Solo

Violin

Sonata, Op. 94a

The use ofcameras orrecording equipment during

theperformance is not allowed.

Forthe convenience ofconcertgoers

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

Sunday Evening, October 25, 1998

at Seven O’Glock

West Building, West Garden Court

Admission Free
PROGRAM

Claude Debussy Quartet in G Minor, Opus 10

(1862-1918) (1893)

Anime et tres decide

Assez vif et bien rythme

Andantino doucement expressif

Tres modere; tres anime

Kelly-Marie Murphy This is My Voice

(b. 1964) (1994)

Washington premiereperformance

INTERMISSION

Edvard Grieg String Quartet in G Minor, Opus 27

(1843-1907) (1877-1878)

Andante; allegro

Andantino; allegro agitato

Allegro molto marcato 

Lento; presto al saltarello

First National Gallery performance

TheAlcan QuartetsappearanceattheNationalGallery

has beenassistedby agrantfrom the Embassy ofCanada.

Founded in 1989, the Alcan Quartet is one of the outstanding

ensembles of its kind in Canada today. Holding a residency in

Chicoutimi, Quebec, the quartet represents a unique cooperation between industry and the arts, as its major support comes 

from the multinational aluminum company whose name it carries. The members of the quartet occupy the principal chairs of 

their respective sections in the Orchestre symphomque du SaguenayLac-St-Jean, under whose auspices the quartet was formed.

The primary purpose of the quartet is the enrichment of the

cultural and musical life of the Saguenay-Lac-St-Jean region.

With a repertoire of more than 100 works, numerous radio broadcasts, five compact discs in worldwide distribution, and an average of fifty concerts per season throughout Canada, the United

States, and Europe, the success of the quartet has far exceeded

all preliminary expectations. The quartet has collaborated with

such renowned artists as pianistsJean-Phillipe Collard and MarcAndre Hamelin, clarinetist James Campbell, and cellist Phillipe

Muller.

First violinist Brett Molzan is from Edmonton, Alberta, and

studied at McGill University in Montreal. Nathalie Camus, second violinist, of Montreal, studied at the St. Louis Conservatory in St. Louis, Missouri. Violist Luc Beauchemin is from

Quebec City and studied at Laval University. Cellist David Ellis

graduated from the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia

and is a native of Burlington, Vermont.

Although much of Debussy’s music is for piano, he devoted a

good deal of his energy to music for other instruments, whether

solo or in combination, and looked to the string quartet as a

measure of his skill as a composer. The theme of the String

Quartet in G Minor, Opus 10 is derived from the interval of the

tritone, with the result that the tonality is ambiguous, but never

relinquished. Each movement has its own key signature, but

Debussy’s tonal center for the quartet as a whole remains G

minor. The use of the whole-tone scale (inspired by Indonesian

gamelan music), with its inherent tritones, appears in this work

parenthetically. The theme is subject to so many transformations that at times it becomes almost undiscernible. There is

an Andalusian dance in the second movement, which later gives

rise to an elongated, morose Andante that is awash in kaleidoscopic harmony.

Kelly-Marie Murphy was born in 1964 in Sardegna, Italy, and

grew up on Armed Forces bases in various parts of Canada. She 

began studying composition at the University of Calgary and

completed her doctorate at the University of Leeds in England. 

She received first prizes in the New Works Calgary Composers 

Competition (1992) and the Bradford Young Composers Competition (1993). Her orchestral piece, From the Drum Comes a

ThunderingBeat earned a place in the top ten recommended works

at the International Rostrum ofComposers in Paris in 1996. She

was awarded first and second prizes in the 1998 Maryland

Composer’s Competition at Loyola College in Baltimore. KellyMarie Murphy has enjoyed the support of commissions by the

CBC and the Canada Council for works to be performed by some

of Canada’s leading ensembles, including the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, Nexus, and the Millennium Ensemble.

About This is My Voice, which won first prize and the People’s

Choice Award at the Canadian Broadcasting Company’s Young

Composers Competition in 1994, Murphy writes: “[It] was initially inspired by a Leonard Cohen poem by the same name. 

The essence of the piece, and I believe of the poem as well, is

that even when we speak in whispers we can say important and

provocative things, and that soft voices should not be dismissed

or shouted down. Musically, I explored this thesis throughout

the four movements of the piece. Each movement begins with

a solo recitative for each of the four instruments in turn, and all

are related to each other in character and content. In the first 

three movements, this soft lyrical quality of the solo is usurped

by frantic activity of varying levels of intensity. The fast music

is always a fairly static exploration of one repetitive and limited

idea. Each instrument is saying roughly the same thing, but

they rarely agree on it, or communicate directly with one another. Finally, in the fourth movement, the quiet reflective quality of the solo is embraced by all four instruments, and, like a

good conversation, there are moments of static as well as dynamic communication.

Ending with such an exhalation of energy is somewhat of a

risk musically, especially when it is preceded by intentionally

aggravated music. It was, however, important for me to follow

this thesis to its logical conclusion, and, if anything, I think it

proves the point: the whisper can conquer the scream.”

Written in his lovely cottage on the shores of the fjord at Lofthus 

during his thirty-fourth and thirty-fifth years, Grieg’s StringQuartet

in G Minor, Op. 21 stands today as one of the finest examples of

chamber music writing. This assessment is based on his unique