Dutch composer Maarten van Norden studied the clarinet with Jan

Koene, a member of the Concertgebouw Orchestra, and composition 

with Louis Andriessen at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague. Van

Norden holds a master of music degree from the Yale School of Music,

where he studied with Jacob Druckman, Martin Bresnick, and Allen

Forte, supported by a Fulbright grant. He teaches theory at the Utrecht 

Conservatory and is currently working on a symphonic piece for the

Dutch Radio Philharmonic Orchestra.

Bring in da fonk consists of three parts. Tsumi is the Japanese word for 

tidal wave, and the first part exhibits a level of energy appropriate to its

title. The harmony is based on a twelve-tone row, but Tsumi does not

sound like twelve-tone music, thanks to the composer’s free use of the

techniques associated with that style. There are references to the

American composer Charles Ives and to minimalism (music that may

have extended reiterations of a motif or a group of motifs). The second

part {Ode) is an homage to Beethoven. There is a sense of nostalgia for 

the classical period, but a jazz-bass figure constantly interferes. The third 

part {Da fonk) is clearly influenced by Van Norden’s background in jazzrock and fusion. This part is the furthest removed from the standard 

classical or modem trio repertoire. There is a slow groove in the

beginning, and a faster one based on a jazz-rock lick near the end.

However, Van Norden’s use of atonal harmonies is definitely not in

accordance with the jazz-rock idiom.

Dvorak wrote four works in the piano trio genre. The most original and

popular of his trios is Op. 70, No. 1 (“Dumky”). “Its musical importance 

possibly exceeds that of all Dvorak’s other chamber works, and,

significantly enough, it is the least traditional in construction” (Hanspeter 

Krellmann: Piano Trios of Dvorak and Smetana, a performance review 

translated from the German by John Coombs). Eschewing the traditional 

form that he applied to his previous piano trios, Dvorak instead opted for 

an avant-garde approach by eliminating the traditional three-movement 

format. In its place, he juxtaposed six variegated mood stmctures, 

creating a six-movement suite. Although each movement is assigned its

own key, disposition, rhythm, and texture, there is unity in the trio as a

whole. “The instrumental scoring of the six pieces helps to establish the

inner link between them, but it is not the decisive element” (Krellman). 

That element is uniqueness, firmly and beautifully established by a work

that is bold, multicolored, and, above all, highly idiomatic.

The Fifty-ninth Season of

THE WILLIAM NELSON CROMWELL and

F. LAMMOT BELIN CONCERTS

Program notes by Elmer Booze National Gallery of Art

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.

Selectionsfrom concerts at the Gallery

can be heard on the second Sunday ofeach month

at 9:00 p.m. on WGMS-FM, 103.5.

-'TV*

. 1

F

23

Concerts in March 2001

Sundays at 7:00 p.m. in the West Building, West Garden Court

Under the Direction of George Manos

2376th Concert

OSIRIS PIANO TRIO

18 Mykola Suk, pianist

25 The Westminster Choir

Joseph Flummerfelt, conductor

Nancianne Parrella, pianist

Liszt: Sonata in B Minor

Haydn: Sonata in E-flat Major

Kolessa: Two Preludes

Thalberg: Fantasy on “Moses in

Egypt”

Works by Victoria, Stravinsky, 

Bruckner, Brahms, Copland, 

Durufle, Vaughan Williams, 

Menotti, and other composers

PETER BRUNT, violin

LARISSA GROENEVELD, cello

SEPP GROTENHUIS, piano

Sunday Evening, 11 March 2000

Seven O'clock

West Building, West Garden Court

Admissionfree
PROGRAM

Ludwig van Beethoven Piano Trio in D Major (“Ghost”)

(1770-1827) Op. 70, No. 1 (1808)

Allegro vivace e con brio

Largo assai ed espressivo 

Finale: Presto

Maarten van Norden Bring in da fonk

(b. 1955) (1998)

Part 1: Tsumi 

Part 2: Ode

Part 3: Da fonk

Commissioned by Fonds voor de Scheppende Toonkunst

Washington premiere performance

INTERMISSION

Antonin Dvorak Piano Trio in E Minor (“Dumky”)

(1840-1893) Op. 90 (1890-1891)

Lento maestoso 

Poco adagio

Andante

Andante moderato (quasi tempo di marcia)

Allegro

Lento maestoso

The Osiris Trio was formed in 1988 and was just four years old when it

received the 1992 Phillip Morris Finest Selection prize. In April 1997 the

trio made its United States debut with a highly successful performance in

Carnegie Recital Hall. In June of that year the trio received the Annie

Bosboom Prize, an incentive award encouraging international careers in

music. The Osiris Trio has recordings on the Channel Classics label that

include works by Beethoven, Dvorak, and Ives, and appears at the

National Gallery by arrangement with Lisa Sapinkopf Artists of

Berkeley, California.

The members of the Osiris Trio are three of The Netherlands’

foremost musicians. Violinist Peter Brunt, a cum laude graduate of the

Conservatory of Amsterdam, studied there under Herman Krebbers and

Davina van Wely. He also studied at the Juilliard School of Music under 

Dorothy Delay, and in Salzburg, Austria, under Sandor Vegh. In 1981

Peter Brunt won first prize in the Dutch National Violin Competition, 

and he was the finalist in the 1987 Tibor Varga International Violin 

Competition in Switzerland. He is currently professor of violin at the

Royal Conservatory in The Hague.

Cellist Larissa Groeneveld studied with Dimitri Ferschtman at the

Sweelinck Conservatory in Amsterdam, from which she graduated with

the highest awards. Further studies took her to Germany, where she

studied with Natalia Gutman and participated in master classes held by

Mstislav Rostropovich and Yo-Yo Ma. The numerous awards she has

won include the first prize at the Luis Coleman International Competition 

in Spain (1984), the Grand prix for cello in Bourg-Madame, France 

(1991), and the Press Prize at the Zilina Festival in Slovakia (1992).

Pianist Sepp Grotenhuis (substituting for pianist Ellen Corver) studied 

for five years at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia under the

tutelage of two of the world’s most prominent artist-teachers, Gary

Graffman and Leon Fleisher. In addition, Grotenhuis has studied all the

piano works of Schoenberg with Leonard Stein of the Schoenberg 

Institute in Los Angeles. He is very active as both a chamber musician 

and a soloist.

Among the works Beethoven produced during the fruitful year 1808 were

his Fifth and Sixth Symphonies, the Choral Fantasia, and the two piano

trios of Op. 70. Beethoven returned to the piano trio format after a hiatus

of several years, during which he had fully matured, both in personal

terms and as a composer. The trios were dedicated to Countess Anna

Marie Erdody, whom he admired. The first performance, initiated by the

countess and held in her salon in 1808, featured a “star ensemble” with

Beethoven at the piano, Ignaz Schuppanzigh (1776-1830) on the violin,

and Joseph Linke (1783-1837) on the cello. The opening movement 

(Allegro vivace e con brio) presents themes that are as dramatic as they

are contrasting. The first theme, vigorous and bold, is played in octaves

by the three instruments, after which the cello plays a second theme that

is resplendent in its lyricism. The commodious use of both subjects in

proximal imitation injects a feeling of hopelessness without salvation. A

lengthy development section that explores diversity by means of sudden

shifts in dynamics and texture is followed by the closing coda, which

adopts octave scales from the opening theme.

A continuation of this solemn mood prevails in the second movement 

(Largo assai ed espressivo), which has the distinction of being perhaps

the longest slow movement in all of Beethoven’s chamber music. The

German writer and composer, E.T.A. Hoffmann (1776-1822), writing in

the Leipzig Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung, said: “The second

movement...has a character of gentle sadness that is like balm to the

mind.” The violin and cello open the movement by playing in octaves. A

seven-note theme conjures a ghostly motif that is repeated without 

interruption throughout the entire section. In the trio of this movement, 

weightless tremolo chords from the piano accentuate the eeriness, 

prompting an editor to add the subtitle, Geister-Trio (“Ghost Trio”), to

the published score. The third movement (Finale: Presto), wrapped in

the sonata-allegro form, distances itself in spirit and emotion from its

preceding companions with a sunlit exterior that quickly expunges the

aftermath of a lugubrious night and brings the trio to a convivial and

extroverted conclusion.