Last updated: May 17, 2022
Repertoire
Midnight Sun Variations
Finnish composer Outi Tarkiainen’s Midnight Sun Variations is an orchestral piece, she says, that
“…is about the light in the arctic summer night, when the northern sky above the Arctic Circle reflects a rich spectrum of infinitely nuanced hues that, as autumn draws near, become veiled in shadow until darkness slowly descends and the sun ceases to rise above the horizon; when Europe’s biggest and most unpolluted wildernesses, the tundra and dense coniferous forests mystified by Jean Sibelius in his last large-scale work, Tapiola (1926), are bathed in countless shades of light.”
Commissioned by the National Arts Centre Orchestra and the BBC Philharmonic, Midnight Sun Variations was premiered by the BBC Philharmonic conducted by John Storgårds, the work’s dedicatee, at the BBC Proms on August 4, 2019. It has since been performed over a dozen times in the UK, US, Finland, and Germany, and tonight’s performance constitutes the piece’s Canadian premiere.
Along with the changing arctic light as summer transitions to autumn, Tarkiainen notes an additional inspiration for her work:
“My first child was born on the night when the summer’s last warm day gave way to a dawn shrouded in autumnal mist. Midnight Sun Variations is also about giving birth to new life, when the woman and the child within her part, restoring her former self as the light fades into autumn.”
“The work begins”, she describes, “with a sparkling ray of sunshine: the orchestra radiates and rises, playfully traces its round and goes back to the beginning again.” A cascade of scales in the woodwinds and strings marks the beginning of each new cycle (or variation), followed by various musical gestures evoking natural phenomena—shimmering light, bird calls, wind. “Solitary wind solos soar above the orchestra, softly proclaiming the peace of the summer night to answering sighs from a horn.”
Then, “a new beginning finally emerges in the strings: a chord beating with rugged primitive force that fills the whole space with its warmth.” At this point in the score, Tarkainen includes this quote by Robert Crottet on the land of the Skolt-Lapps from Fôrets de la lune, 1949: “It is not our fault if, in your country, dream and reality are so closely bound together that one cannot well distinguish one from the other.” Tarkiainen continues, “This sets off a pulse of constantly remixing chords that ultimately fires the whole orchestra into action, until the strings break away, ascend to the heights and impart maybe the most important message of all.” A seismic climax signals the moment of change—from summer to autumn, the birth of a child. Gradually, the piece fades on melodic fragments in the violins, amidst a brooding and shimmering backdrop.
Program notes by Dr. Hannah Chan-Hartley
Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K. 466
I. Allegro
II. Romanze
III. Rondo: Allegro assai
“I tell you before God, and as an honest man, that your son is the greatest composer I know, either in person or by reputation.” According to Leopold Mozart in a letter to his daughter Nannerl, these words of praise came from no less a figure than the great Austrian composer Franz Joseph Haydn, who witnessed the premiere of the D minor Piano Concerto with Wolfgang as soloist on February 10, 1785, at Vienna’s Mehlgrube Casino. Haydn wasn’t the only one captivated by the work: the young Beethoven became a notable interpreter. It was one of the few works by Mozart that was played throughout the 19th century—Felix Mendelssohn had the concerto in his performing repertory, as did Clara Schumann and Johannes Brahms. Today, it continues to be a favourite with concert pianists and audiences.
No. 20’s minor mode is unusual among Mozart’s concertos (Piano Concerto No. 24, K. 491, is the only other in a minor key) and is an essential contributing element to the work’s tempestuous character. Within its brooding atmosphere, an intense musical drama arises between the soloist and orchestra. The first movement begins mysteriously, agitatedly, with throbbing syncopations in the upper strings, and urgent rising figures in the cellos and basses. Tension steadily mounts to a full orchestral outburst, which becomes a recurring motif. Solo piano enters with a new theme, somewhat melancholy and wistful, after which it's caught up in the orchestra’s turmoil. Later, the piano presents a gentle second theme in the major mode, but the melody’s reassuring quality is soon disrupted by an orchestral flare-up. In the middle section, the piano’s first theme and the strings’ opening syncopations and figures are revisited in alternation, after which the piano undertakes a sequence of brilliant passages. The main thematic materials are then reprised between piano and orchestra in an artful interweaving. After the soloist’s cadenza, the orchestra has one last stormy flash before subsiding at the movement’s close.
The Romanze is a gentle serenade, the melody of which solo piano and orchestra take turns singing. Its presentation alternates with two episodes; in the first of these, the piano calmly elaborates, as if the continuation of a reflective operatic aria. By contrast, the second episode, in minor mode, is all nervous anxiety, as the solo piano traverses across the keyboard with rapid triplets, while the woodwinds intone expressive phrases and sustained chords. Turbulence returns in the finale, which the piano launches on its own with a defiant theme, followed by an orchestral response of fierce intensity. As the movement progresses, this conflict is gradually diffused, including by way of a jaunty woodwind tune. Listen for how this tune later tries to be serious in the minor mode, but then, after the soloist’s second cadenza, it emerges, bright and cheerful, reassuring us that all’s well at the end.
Program notes by Dr. Hannah Chan-Hartley
Symphony No. 6
I. Maestoso
II. Adagio: Sehr feierlich (very solemn)
III. Scherzo: Nicht schnell (not fast)
IV. Finale: Bewegt, doch nicht zu schnell (animated, but not too fast)
Anton Bruckner began composing his Sixth Symphony in September 1879. He worked on it periodically, finishing the score two years later in September 1881. The second and third movements were performed in Vienna in February 1883, but it wasn’t until 1899 that the symphony was given in its entirety, albeit in a heavily edited version, conducted by Gustav Mahler, also in Vienna. The first performance of the original score occurred in 1901, in Stuttgart, conducted by Karl Pohlig.
The expansive scale of Bruckner’s symphonies and the distinctive manner in which they unfold sometimes pose challenges to comprehension, so it’s worth mentioning here some stylistic hallmarks that may help guide listening. For one, the general progress of these works can be said to trace a large narrative arc akin to a pilgrim’s journey of faith—through spiritual struggle to triumphant redemption, a concept undoubtedly shaped by the composer’s own devout Catholicism. One way Bruckner achieves this sense of advancement is via frequent harmonic modulation, never settling in one key for long, and thus deferring resolution until the end of the movement or the symphony. The uncertain feeling caused by these shifts are underscored by sudden changes in thematic character and dynamics. Musical material is often presented in block-like sections, juxtaposing delicate, pastoral episodes with monumental, granitic walls of sound; these develop into climaxes, though rarely resting at the summit except at the final climax usually at the work’s conclusion. All these aspects are present in the Sixth Symphony.
Violins on a driving rhythmic figure set the stage for the first movement’s noble theme, first played quietly by cellos and basses, later boldly proclaimed by woodwinds and brass. Soon after, the vigorous energy dissipates, giving way to the violins’ gentle second theme. Against a backdrop of three beats to one long beat, the melody assumes a waltz-like lilt. In the central development section, triplet arpeggios accompany the first theme in a lyrical inverted version. The energy gradually builds to a grand brass statement of the main theme—listen here for the drastic shift from E-flat major to A major, keys sonically worlds apart. After a reprise of the second theme, the music resets and cycles through rising waves of the main theme, culminating in a blazing declaration by the trumpets at the movement’s end.
Richly orchestrated and deeply expressive, the Adagio is the Sixth Symphony’s emotional heart. Three main melodies are presented in turn: the first serious and pensive, in the rich lower register of the violins; the second sincere and passionate, its opening gesture played by cellos then by the violins at half the speed; the third, solemn violins. They take on greater emotional significance upon their return—the first theme expanding to the biggest climax of the movement, after which we luxuriate in the world of the second theme. The Adagio winds to the close after the third theme’s reprise through a closing section of tender nostalgia.
The Scherzo is characterized by a restless energy and quicksilver textures. On occasion, the orchestra erupts suddenly with brass at full force. The contrasting trio has a pastoral quality, featuring three horns sounding hunting calls, with warm responses by the strings and bucolic woodwinds.
In the finale, any sense of structural and emotional coherence is tested by abrupt changes in vastly contrasting thematic characters—spiritual trials in musical form, perhaps. It opens quietly with anxious phrases in the violins propelled by a plucked descending bass line with viola tremolo. After an initial burst, the brass intone a menacing descending motif, and then a fanfare, reaching a brief triumph. The movement’s charming second theme follows, introduced by the strings in counterpoint. Later, there are glimpses of peace and calm as the brass attempt to reassert their menace; a massive full orchestral passage toils to achieve resolution but is unsuccessful. More starts and stops ensue, as the second theme is reprised first, then eventually the first phrases. Finally, after building through the descending motif, the trombones close the symphony with a full-glory version of the first movement’s opening theme.
Program notes by Dr. Hannah Chan-Hartley
Artists
Principal Guest Conductor of the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa and Chief Conductor of the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, John Storgårds has a dual career as a conductor and violin virtuoso and is widely recognized for his creative flair for programming as well as his rousing yet refined performances. As Artistic Director of the Lapland Chamber Orchestra, a title he has held for over 25 years, Storgårds earned global critical acclaim for the ensemble’s adventurous performances and award-winning recordings.
Internationally, Storgårds appears with such orchestras as the Berliner Philharmoniker, Munich Philharmonic, Orchestre National de France, Vienna Radio Symphony, and the London Philharmonic, as well as all of the major Nordic orchestras, including the Helsinki Philharmonic where he was Chief Conductor from 2008 to 2015. He also regularly returns to the Münchener Kammerorchester, where he was Artistic Partner from 2016 to 2019. Further afield, he appears with the Sydney, Melbourne, Yomiuri Nippon and NHK Symphony Orchestras as well as the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and New York Philharmonic.
Storgårds’s award-winning discography includes not only recordings of works by Schumann, Mozart, Beethoven, and Haydn, but also rarities by Holmboe and Vask, which feature him as violin soloist. Cycles of the complete symphonies of Sibelius (2014) and Nielsen (2015) with the BBC Philharmonic were released to critical acclaim by Chandos. November 2019 saw the release of the third and final volume of works by American avant-garde composer George Antheil. Their latest project, recording the late symphonies of Shostakovich, commenced in April 2020 with the release of Symphony No. 11. In 2023, Storgårds and the BBC Philharmonic were nominated for Gramophone magazine’s Orchestra of the Year Award.
Storgårds studied violin with Chaim Taub and conducting with Jorma Panula and Eri Klas. He received the Finnish State Prize for Music in 2002 and the Pro Finlandia Prize 2012.
Silver medalist and laureate of the Krystian Zimerman Prize at the 2015 International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw, Canadian pianist Charles Richard-Hamelin is standing out today as one of the most important musicians of his generation. In 2014, he also won the second prize at the Montreal International Musical Competition and the third prize at the Seoul International Music Competition in South Korea. Charles is the recipient of the Order of Arts and Letters of Quebec and the prestigious Career Development Award offered by the Women’s Musical Club of Toronto.
He has appeared in various prestigious festivals including La Roque d’Anthéron in France, the Prague Spring Festival, the “Chopin and his Europe” Festival in Warsaw and the Lanaudière Festival in Canada. As a soloist, he has performed with more than fifty ensembles including the main symphony orchestras of Canada (Montreal, Toronto, Ottawa, Métropolitain, Québec, Edmonton, Calgary…) as well as with the Warsaw Philharmonic, Sinfonia Varsovia, Singapore Symphony Orchestra, the Korean Symphony Orchestra, OFUNAM (Mexico), les Violons du Roy and I Musici de Montréal. He has played under the baton of renowned conductors such as Kent Nagano, Rafael Payare, Antoni Wit, Vasily Petrenko, Jacek Kaspszyk, Aziz Shokhakimov, Peter Oundjian, Jacques Lacombe, Fabien Gabel, Bernard Labadie, Carlo Rizzi, Alexander Prior, Giancarlo Guerrero, Christoph Campestrini, Lan Shui and Jean-Marie Zeitouni. Charles Richard-Hamelin is a graduate from McGill University, the Yale School of Music, the Conservatoire de Musique de Montréal and has studied with Paul Surdulescu, Sara Laimon, Boris Berman, André Laplante et Jean Saulnier.
Charles Richard-Hamelin has recorded eight albums to this day, all published on the Analekta label. In 2015, he first recorded acclaimed performances of Chopin’s last works. Launched in 2016, his second album brings together works by Beethoven, Enescu and Chopin, recorded in concert at the Palais Montcalm in Québec City. His discography then was enriched by three more CDs, one devoted to the first part of a complete collection of Beethoven violin and piano sonatas, recorded with the solo violinist of the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, Andrew Wan. His second offering, devoted to Chopin’s two piano concertos, was recorded live in concert at Montréal’s Maison symphonique with the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal under the direction of Kent Nagano. His most recent collaboration with Les Violons du Roy led to the release of a Mozart album (Piano Concertos Nos. 22 and 24) conducted by Jonathan Cohen. These albums received awards and enthusiastic reviews from the leading music critics.
More recently, the second volume of his complete Beethoven sonatas for violin and piano with Andrew Wan was released, as well as a new Chopin recital featuring the 24 Preludes, the Andante spianato and the Grande polonaise brillante, Op. 22.
(Born in 1985)
Outi Tarkianen was born in Rovaniemi in Finnish Lapland, a place that has proved a constant source of inspiration for her. She has long been drawn to the expressive power of the human voice, but has written vocal, chamber, and solo instrumental works as well as works for orchestra and soloist. “I see music as a force of nature that can flood over a person and even change entire destinies,” she once said.
Outi has been commissioned by orchestras including the San Francisco Symphony, BBC Symphony, BBC Philharmonic, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, and Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestras, and her music has been taken up by the symphony orchestras of St Louis, Detroit, and Houston, among others. Her early work with jazz orchestras culminated in Into the Woodland Silence (2013), a score that combined the composer’s sense of natural mysticism with the distinctive textures of the jazz orchestra tradition. Major works since include an orchestral song cycle to texts by Sami poets The Earth, Spring’s Daughter (2015), the saxophone concerto Saivo (2016, nominated for the Nordic Council Music Prize), and Midnight Sun Variations premiered at the BBC Proms in 2019 (nominated for the Fondation Prince Pierre de Monaco’s Musical Composition Prize). Her first full-length opera, A Room of One’s Own (2021), was commissioned and premiered by Theater Hagen in Germany.
Outi studied composition at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, the Guildhall School in London and at the University of Miami. She has been composer-in-residence at the Festival de Musique Classique d’Uzerche in France and was for four years co-artistic director of the Silence Festival in Lapland.
By Andrew Mellor
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
(1756–1791)
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was an Austrian composer. He wrote prolifically in nearly all the musical genres of his day, including operas, concertos, symphonies (and other types of instrumental pieces), string quartets and other works for chamber ensembles of various instrumental combinations, sacred and secular vocal music, dance music, and solo keyboard pieces. Many of his most significant works continue to be frequently performed in today’s opera houses and concert halls. Beautiful melodies, elegant formal structures, and rich textures and harmonies combined with a rhetorical manner highly influenced by Italian opera are hallmarks of his mature style.
Mozart was born on January 27, 1756, in Salzburg. His father Leopold, a violinist and composer, recognized early on that his son had musical talent and devoted himself to his (and Wolfgang’s sister Nannerl’s) education in music and other subjects. Over the next decade, Leopold took them both on extensive tours across Europe, during which the young Mozart gave performances (including of his own music) on the harpsichord and violin in the homes of the nobility and at public concerts. After three years as “honorary” Konzertmeister at the Salzburg court, Mozart moved into paid employment status in 1772. In this position, he initially fulfilled his duties of providing music for the church and court eagerly; however, over time, his enthusiasm for the latter waned due the restrictions his employer, the Archbishop Hieronymus Colloredo, had placed on the performance of instrumental music. Undeterred, he continued to compose instrumental and secular vocal music for private patrons. In 1777, Mozart petitioned Colloredo for release from employment but was instead dismissed by the archbishop, though he returned in 1779 as court organist, when he was unable to secure a permanent position elsewhere.
In June 1781, while in Vienna at Colloredo’s request, Mozart got his wish to be formally released from the archbishop’s service. He began to pursue a freelance career in the city as a teacher, keyboard performer, and composer. In August 1782, he married Constanze Weber; they went on to have six children, though four died in infancy. The period between 1784 and 1788 became the most productive and fruitful years of his life, during which he conducted performances; was in demand as a keyboard player for public and private concerts; created some of his most notable works (among them, 12 piano concertos, six string quartets dedicated to Haydn, the operas Le nozze di Figaro and Don Giovanni, and what would be his final three symphonies); and his music was widely published and performed. Despite this success, Mozart was later troubled by financial woes, due, in part, to the cost of maintaining his social status in Viennese society. In the last years of his life, he completed works such as the Clarinet Quintet, and the operas Die Zauberflöte and La clemenza di Tito. Mozart was working on a Requiem under secret commission by Count Walsegg-Stuppach, which he left incomplete when he succumbed to his final illness on December 5, 1791, in Vienna.
By Dr. Hannah Chan-Hartley
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Anton Bruckner
(1824–1896)
Anton Bruckner was an Austrian composer and teacher, as well as an internationally renowned organ virtuoso during his lifetime. His compositional catalogue includes works for organ, piano, and chamber ensemble (including a string quintet), large vocal pieces with instruments, choral works both sacred and secular, and nine symphonies for which, along with his sacred compositions, he is best known today. His symphonies, notably, synthesize the Classical-era formal traditions of Ludwig van Beethoven and Franz Schubert, albeit with an innovative slant, and the harmonic and orchestration techniques of Richard Wagner, one of his musical idols. His music in general is also shaped by his devout Catholic faith.
Born in Ansfelden, near Linz, on September 4, 1824, Bruckner was involved in his village’s musical activities from a young age and was sent by his parents to his cousin Johann Baptist Weiss for studies in violin, piano, and composition. Following the death of his father in 1837, he was admitted as a chorister at the Augustinian monastery of St. Florian, where for three years, alongside singing and his regular schooling, studied violin and organ and played piano for chamber concerts there. After working as a teacher in various villages from 1841, he returned to St. Florian in 1845, where he was employed for the next decade as assistant schoolteacher and singing instructor; in 1850, he became the monastery’s provisory organist. Amidst his busy schedule, he found time to compose, at this time mostly choral music and secular cantatas.
In 1855, Bruckner became the Dom-und-Stadtpfarrkirchen organist in Linz; he also embarked on an unusually dedicated period to the rigorous study of harmony and counterpoint with Viennese theorist Simon Sechter until 1861, during which he abstained from composing. From 1861 to 1863, he studied form and orchestration with Otto Kitzler, who introduced Bruckner to Wagner’s music dramas. He subsequently completed several substantial works, including his First Symphony in 1866.
Bruckner moved to Vienna in 1868 to teach at the city’s conservatory, where he remained on faculty until he retired in 1891. He also worked as an organist at the Hofkapelle, and garnered an international reputation as a virtuoso, with tours to Nancy and Paris in 1869 and London in 1871. As a composer, he focused on writing symphonies, completing Nos. 2 to 5 between 1871 and 1876. The premiere of his Third Symphony (dedicated to Wagner) was disastrous, having been caught up in the musical-political debate in which the conservative Viennese public and critical establishment viewed Bruckner’s music as “decadent” in its association with Wagner. Thereafter, he began the practice of revising his scores. By the mid-1880s, however, Bruckner found champions of his work in the young composers and musicians who were involved in groups such as the Viennese Academic Wagner Society, of which Gustav Mahler was a member. Performances of his Seventh Symphony, as well as the Third (including at New York’s Metropolitan Opera House) brought Bruckner renown as a composer. Suffering ill health in his final years, he died on October 11, 1896, while still working on the finale of his Ninth Symphony.
By Dr. Hannah Chan-Hartley
NAC Orchestra
FIRST VIOLINS
Yosuke Kawasaki (concertmaster)
Jessica Linnebach (associate concertmaster)
Noémi Racine Gaudreault (assistant concertmaster)
Elaine Klimasko**
Marjolaine Lambert
Jeremy Mastrangelo
Manuela Milani
Frédéric Moisan
Martine Dubé*
Annie Guénette*
Soo Gyeong Lee*
Erica Miller*
Sarah Williams*
SECOND VIOLINS
Mintje van Lier (principal)
Winston Webber (assistant principal)
Mark Friedman
Carissa Klopoushak
Leah Roseman
Edvard Skerjanc**
Karoly Sziladi
Emily Westell
Andréa Armijo-Fortin*
Renée London*
Sara Mastrangelo*
Heather Schnarr*
VIOLAS
Jethro Marks (principal)
David Marks (associate principal)
David Goldblatt (assistant principal)
Paul Casey
Ren Martin-Doike
David Thies-Thompson**
Kelvin Enns*
Sonya Probst*
CELLOS
Rachel Mercer (principal)
Julia MacLaine (assistant principal)
Timothy McCoy
Marc-André Riberdy
Leah Wyber
Desiree Abbey*
Karen Kang*
DOUBLE BASSES
Joseph Phillips (guest principal)*
Hilda Cowie (acting assistant principal)
Marjolaine Fournier
Vincent Gendron
Paul Mach*
FLUTES
Joanna G’froerer (principal)
Stephanie Morin
Kaili Maimets*
OBOES
Charles Hamann (principal)**
Anna Petersen
Susan Butler*
Melissa Scott*
ENGLISH HORN
Anna Petersen
CLARINETS
Kimball Sykes (principal)
Sean Rice
Shauna Barker*
BASSOONS
Christopher Millard (principal)
Vincent Parizeau
Joelle Amar*
HORNS
Lawrence Vine (principal)
Julie Fauteux (associate principal)
Elizabeth Simpson
Lauren Anker
Louis-Pierre Bergeron
Olivier Brisson*
TRUMPETS
Karen Donnelly (principal)
Steven van Gulik
Michael Fedyshyn*
Larry Larson*
TROMBONES
Donald Renshaw (principal)
Colin Traquair
BASS TROMBONE
Douglas Burden
TUBA
Chris Lee (principal)
TIMPANI
Feza Zweifel (principal)
PERCUSSION
Jonathan Wade
Tim Francom*
Louis Pino*
HARP
Angela Schwarzkopf*
KEYBOARDS
Frédéric Lacroix*
PRINCIPAL LIBRARIAN
Nancy Elbeck
ASSISTANT LIBRARIAN
Corey Rempel
PERSONNEL MANAGER
Meiko Lydall
ASSISTANT PERSONNEL MANAGER
Laurie Shannon
*Additional musicians
**On leave
Non-titled members of the Orchestra are listed alphabetically