Gethsemane/A Tone Picture for String Orchestra with Cello Solo

by Richard Cerchia

(The present recording is MIDI realized using the Garritan Personal Orchestra. Score and Parts available by contacting thecomposer at cerchiamusic@hotmail.com)

Richard Cerchia: Gethsemane/A Tone Picture for String Orchestra with Cello Solo- Final

“Gethsemane/A Tone Picture” reflects on the atmosphere, struggles, anguish and final peace and determination Jesus found that night in the Garden of Gethsemane. While the music was initially instigated by some of the composer’s own inner struggles, the vision grew in the compositional process beyond that pain to the infinitely greater pain Jesus suffered both in the garden and at the cross.

Richard Cerchia (1950 – )
has been composing and arranging for over 35 years. He is a pianist, classical guitarist, vocalist, vocal coach and conductor. He has led various premiers of his own work over the years and has also directed musical theater. Among his other accomplishments, Rick is a writer and an actor.

Review/ Mark L. Taylor, Ph.D.:

I became acquainted with the music of Richard Cerchia in the late 1990’s as a college concert band director. I loved what I saw and heard and wanted my students and audiences to experience it. I commissioned an original piece for the Houghton College Symphonic Winds (Shabach) and an arrangement of contemporary songs to use on tour. I loved Richard’s use and command of a wide variety of structural and developmental devices, diversity of styles, beautiful melodies, and broad palette of harmonic and orchestration colors.

Gethsemane showcases these and many other qualities that make his music attractive and significant in my view. The work is subtitled “A Tone Picture” and it is intended to express the intense angst, struggle with darkness, and ultimate resoluteness of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane as described in the biblical accounts. This tripartite outline also constitutes the overall form of the work. From an analytic perspective, the piece is something akin to classical sonata form consisting of an “exposition,” “development,” and “recapitulation.” The first large section, the “exposition,” so-to-speak, is comprised of an introduction followed by the cello solo theme which is followed by a second thematic section presenting 16th-note melodic fragments passed around the orchestra. All of the thematic and motivic material is presented in the exposition including the primary “germ” motive – 8th notes rising and falling a major second – and the cello theme.

In the second large section, the “development,” we feel Christ’s battle with the forces of darkness. The first violins wrestle mightily with the second violins and violas using melodic material from the cello theme accompanied by a percussive primeval 7/8 rhythm pattern reminiscent of Igor Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring. The conflict continues to escalate in rhythmic and dynamic intensity to an abrupt stop. The soft period that follows recalls the 16th-note fragment theme and initiates the transition to the recapitulation. In this transition, we sense Christ coming to peace and resoluteness as the rumblings of conflict fade and the music becomes increasingly bright and “airy.” The strong dissonance melts into consonance and the texture thins through wider spacing in the orchestration and wider intervallic relationships. Finally, just before the return of the cello solo, the first violins play a light, high, floating melody over a thin accompaniment in the second violins and violas. Suddenly, the harmony shifts from D up to a sustained D# tonality. The effect is absolutely stunning. It is as if the sun suddenly breaks through the clouds and light bathes the world.

The recapitulation begins with a restating of the beginning phrases of the cello theme. The solo is briefly interrupted by a gentle, celebratory dance involving the cellos, violas and second violins. Richard’s mastery of contrapuntal writing is displayed vividly in this trio in which the cello melody is rephrased into 6/8 time. The cello solo returns once again and finally, the soft introduction returns quite literally. The cello closes the work with one last fading pitch.

I love this piece. The more I study it, the more amazed I am by Richard’s mastery of so many aspects, techniques and devices of composition. Give it a listen and I think you will want to listen again and again. If you do, I believe you too will be amazed.

Respectfully submitted,

Mark L. Taylor, Ph.D.

Web Site: www.cerchiamusic.com

Sonata no.2 K280
Presto

Aldo Ciccolini

From Mozart : Alla Turca (2011)

Released by La Dolce Volta

Mozart: Sonata no.2 K280 – Presto


Over the course of his 60-year career Aldo Ciccolini has established an intimate relationship with the great composers. Now aged 85, he takes a fresh look at one of the greatest and says “I understand Mozart now”.

For this recording Aldo Ciccolini plunged into the past, to his earliest years: he says that with the Bechstein he rediscovers “the sound of my childhood” and that this new energy does justice to the impetuous spirit of an untamed genius. Although he has played and replayed these three sonatas for so many years, they suddenly rise to new heights, borne by the deep relationship between the two masters.

It took Mozart 17 years to write these sonatas; it took Ciccolini 85 to transcend them.

Official website

6 Moments Musicaux D.780
III Allegretto moderato

Paul Lewis

From Schubert –
Piano Sonata D.845
“Wandererfantasie” D.760
4 Impromptus D.935
Moments Musicaus D.780 (2012)

Released by Harmonia Mundi


Schubert: 6 Moments Musicaux D.780 – III Allegretto moderato

“Lewis’s mature insight into the workings and emotional characteristics of these works lends his interpretations particular power and depth. ” Daily Telegraph

Official website

Aria Serpetta (Sunhae Im, Soprano)
Appena mi vedon

Freiburger Barockorchester
René Jacobs

From Mozart – La Finta Giardiniera (2012)

Released by Harmonia Mundi

Mozart: La Finta Giardiniera – Aria Serpetta (Appena mi vedon)


One of the least known operas of the young Mozart, rediscovered by René Jacobs who sees here ” a very ancient form of theatre, which blithely mingles farce with great passions, and elements of a modern initiatory opera.”

Official website

An den Mond D.259

Matthias Goerne, baryton
Andreas Haefliger, piano

From Schubert – Erlkönig

Released by Harmonia Mundi

Schubert: Erlkönig – An den Mond D.259


‘New edition features composer’s lyrical heartbeat at its most artless and unaffected. Goerne’s Schubert edition is building an impressive head of steam: his choice of a variety of top-rank pianists seems to have stimulated a fresh appetite for music he has been singing for most of his career.’ Financial Times.

Official website

Keyboard Sonatas (1773): Sonata No. 3 in G major
II. Andante con tenerezza

Susan Kagan, piano

From Neefe – Twelve Sonatas (1773) / Beethoven : Nine Variations for Keyboard on a March by Dressler (2012)

Released by Naxos / Grand Piano

Neefe: Sonata No. 3 in G major – II. Andante con tenerezza


Christian Gottlob Neefe (1748-1798)

Christian Gottlob Neefe, born in 1748, is remembered today mainly as Beethoven’s first important teacher in Bonn. Neefe (pronounced Nay-fuh) was a respected and successful musician of his time: Court Organist and Kapellmeister of the Electoral Court Orchestra in Bonn, music director of a prominent theatre group, composer of numerous Singspiele (operettas) and other works, and music teacher. He became Beethoven’s teacher around 1780, in piano, organ, thoroughbass, and composition.

A great admirer of the Bach family, he introduced Beethoven to the Well-Tempered Clavier of J. S. Bach, and the music and writings of Bach’s distinguished son, Carl Phillip Emanuel Bach. In addition, Neefe was a sympathetic and fatherly friend to the young Beethoven, who later wrote to him: “I thank you for the counsel which you gave me so often… If I ever become a great man yours shall be a share of the credit.”

Neefe composed relatively few instrumental works, and these were mostly for
keyboard, principally the clavichord and fortepiano. They were composed during a time of significant stylistic change, as the Baroque period gave way to the Classical period. The Twelve Sonatas, published in 1773, are a mixture of Baroque and early Classical styles. Most of the sonatas are in three movements in the fast-slowfast sequence common in the Classical period. The Baroque influence is seen in the binary form of each movement, similar to Scarlatti keyboard sonatas and the movements of Bach’s dance suites. But the chief musical texture of the Baroque – polyphony, or counterpoint – is virtually abandoned in favour of a homophonic texture of melody and accompaniment. Only Sonata I in D minor (perhaps the earliest of the set) uses imitation prominently in both the first and third movements.

Neefe’s interest and professional association with vocal music is underscored by the emphasis in the sonatas on lyrical accompanied melodies. Several of the slow movements have unusual performance indications that reflect the emotionalism of the new Empfindsamer Stil (“sensitive” or “sensible” style) fashionable during the 1770s, such as Poco lento e languido (Somewhat slow and languid) in Sonata VI), Andante con tenerezza (Andante with tenderness) in Sonata III, Largo e mesto (Very slow and sad) in Sonata V, and Andante con gravità (Andante with gravity) in Sonata XI. Rudimentary sonata form (ABA), arising from binary form and soon to prevail as the dominant formal structure of the classical period, is used by Neefe in most of the sonata movements. As is typical of binary forms, both sections of the movements have repeat signs; but as the material from the first half is usually recapitulated in the second half, only the first section is repeated in this performance. Neefe’s indications for dynamics are sparse; generally the music is rather gentle, perhaps because of the more delicate sound of the clavichord.

The Twelve Sonatas are varied in key, tempo, and style; no two are alike, each has its individual and distinctive character. As a group, they represent some important steps along the path to the flowering Classical period.

Official website

Piano Quartet Op. 8 in B flat major
Menuetto, Allegro

Isabelle Faust, violin
Alexander Melnikov, fortepiano
Boris Faust, viola
Wolfgang Emanuel Schmidt, cello

From Carl Maria Von Weber – Sonatas for Piano and Violin Piano Quartet (2013)

Released by Harmonia Mundi

Carl Maria Von Weber: Piano Quartet Op. 8 in B flat major – Menuetto, Allegro


Was Weber born only to compose Der Freischütz? So, at least, many people have thought, forgetting the existence of a catalogue of more than 300 compositions in every genre. The Piano Quartet, the work of a 22-year-old, already displays the first signs in music of that fantastic Romanticism that E. T. A. Hoffmann was exploring at the same time. As for the delightful Sonatas for piano and violin of 1810, refused by the publisher for their blatant originality (!), they airily mix different styles in an exotic multinational rendezvous.

Official website

Sept Pièces, Op. 15 for Piano 4 Hands
Somnolence

The Invencia Piano Duo

From Schmitt – Complete Original Works For Piano Duet and Duo : 1 (2012)

Released by Naxos / Grand Piano

Schmitt: Sept Pièces, Op. 15 for Piano 4 Hands – Somnolence


Winner of the Prix de Rome in 1900, Florent Schmitt stands alongside Debussy and Ravel as one of the most original and influential French composers of his time. This is the first of four volumes including unpublished work and rarities for piano duo and duet, each representing Schmitt’s rich harmonic palette and good humoured lyricism.

More about Florent Schmitt (1870-1958)

Official website

Les Saisons
March : Song of the Lark

Emile Naoumoff, piano

From Tchaikovsky – Les Saisons, Ouverture Fantaisie Romeo and Juliette, Adagio lamentoso Symphonie no. 6 (2012)

Released by Saphir Productions

Tchaikovsky: Les Saisons – March : Song of the Lark


The field shimmering with flowers,
the stars swirling in the heavens,
the song of the lark
fills the blue abyss.

Apollon Maykov

Official website

Keyboard Sonatas, Collection 2 (1777)
Sonata No. 6 in G major
Grave

Michael Tsalka

From Türk – Keyboard Sonatas Collection I and II (2012)

Released by Naxos / Grand Piano

Türk: Sonata No. 6 in G major – Grave


Daniel Gottlob Türk is best known for his influential pedagogical treatise Klavierschule (1789). His 48 inventive and varied keyboard sonatas were influenced by Sonatas of other North German composers such as CPE Bach and JW Hässler. The five historical keyboards employed in this recording reflect the diversity of the instruments available in Türk’s day. The twelve sonatas encompassed in his first and second collections show how the composer’s sensitive, at times dramatic, oratorical style relates beautifully to the nuanced expressive capabilities of these instruments.

Official website