Thursday, February 20, 8pm Friday, February 21, 1:30pm Allegro ma ...

Thursday, February 20, 8pm Friday, February 21, 1:30pm Saturday, February 22, 8pm | MANFRED HONECK

THE SANDY MOOSE AND ERIC BIRCH CONCERT

conducting

DVORÁK

ROMANCE IN F MINOR FOR VIOLIN AND ORCHESTRA, OPUS 11 ANNE-SOPHIE MUTTER

DVORÁK

VIOLIN CONCERTO IN A MINOR, OPUS 53

Allegro ma non troppo Adagio ma non troppo Allegro giocoso, ma non troppo MS. MUTTER {INTERMISSION} BEETHOVEN

SYMPHONY NO. 3 IN E- FLAT, OPUS 55, “EROICA”

Allegro con brio Marcia funebre. Adagio assai Scherzo: Allegro vivace Finale: Allegro molto BANK OF AMERICA AND EMC CORPORATION ARE PROUD TO SPONSOR THE BSO’ S 2013-2014 SEASON.

The Thursday and Saturday concerts will end about 10:05, the Friday concert about 3:35. Concertmaster Malcolm Lowe performs on a Stradivarius violin, known as the “Lafont,” generously donated to the Boston Symphony Orchestra by the O’Block Family. Steinway and Sons Pianos, selected exclusively for Symphony Hall. Special thanks to The Fairmont Copley Plaza and Fairmont Hotels & Resorts, and Commonwealth Worldwide Chauffeured Transportation. The program books for the Friday series are given in loving memory of Mrs. Hugh Bancroft by her daughters, the late Mrs. A. Werk Cook and the late Mrs. William C. Cox. In consideration of the performers and those around you, please turn off all electronic devices during the concert, including tablets, cellular phones, pagers, watch alarms, and texting devices of any kind. Thank you for your cooperation. Please note that taking pictures of the orchestra—whether photographs or videos—is prohibited during concerts. The Program in Brief... Though seldom heard, Dvorák’s lyrical F minor Romance for violin and orchestra is a thoroughly engaging work whose origins date back to a string quartet he wrote in the fall of 1873. After the quartet failed to find favor, Dvorák adapted music from the slow movement to create his F minor Romance, perhaps taking Beethoven’s own youthful Romances for violin and orchestra as a precedent. When Dvorák actually composed the work is not known; the first performance took place in December 1877, in Prague. Dvorák wrote his Violin Concerto in 1879 for the great Austro-Hungarian violinist Joseph Joachim, who had recently played the first performance of the Violin Concerto by Dvorák’s mentor, Johannes Brahms. It was only in 1882, however, that Dvorák’s concerto reached final form, with Joachim himself taking a substantial role in the revisions. The music displays an engrossing range of thematic and melodic content, orchestral colorations, and moods suggestive of the composer’s native Bohemia. Yet unlike his very popular Cello Concerto, it has yet to find a regular place in the repertoire. One reason must surely be the fiendish difficulty of the solo part. Another may well be the work’s expressive and structural novelties. From the start, when the solo violinist enters after just a few attention-grabbing measures from the orchestra, the first movement suggests a more rhetorical and rhapsodic interplay between soloist and orchestra than would normally be expected. This declamatory approach is typical of the minor-mode

first movement, despite the presence of gentler passages that provide lyrical respite. Following the rhetorical interplay of the first movement, Dvorák moves without pause into an expansive, majormode slow movement. Though not entirely unshadowed, this movement gives full rein to Dvorák’s melodic bent. The rondo finale is a major-mode romp based in Czech dance rhythms, and filled with colorful episodes that contrast ingeniously with the rhythmically energized main theme. Though Beethoven completed his Third Symphony early in 1804, the title Eroica seems not to have been used until the parts were first published in October 1806, with the heading (in Italian) “Heroic Symphony composed to celebrate the memory of a great man.” One of the most famous anecdotes about Beethoven concerns the title of this piece. Upon hearing that Napoleon had declared himself Emperor in May 1804, Beethoven—who had planned to name the work in Napoleon’s honor— reportedly flew into a rage, tore the title page in half, and rechristened it “Sinfonia eroica.” But even after that, the composer still referred to Napoleon as inspiration for the symphony. In the end, more important than any of this is the power of the music itself. In its size and shape, in the density and complexity of its musical ideas, in its overall scope, in its extramusical associations (i.e., the Napoleon connection), Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony was light-years apart from any symphony written before it. Having opened the door to a new world of musical expression, it retains its power to thrill and startle even today. Marc Mandel Antonín Dvorák Romance in F minor for violin and orchestra, Opus 11 ANTONÍN DVORÁK was born in Nelahozeves (Mühlhausen), Bohemia, near Prague, on September 8, 1841, and died in Prague on May 1, 1904. He composed his Romance for violin and orchestra at some time between October 1873 and December 9, 1877, the date of the first performance, which took place in Prague with soloist Josef Markus and the orchestra of the National Theater conducted by Adolf ˇCech. The musical material is drawn from the slow movement of a then still unpublished string quartet that Dvorák had composed in September and October 1873. IN ADDITION TO THE SOLO VIOLIN, the score calls for an orchestra of two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns, and strings. In addition to his nine symphonies, the concertos, oratorios, operas, and other works on a grand scale, Dvorák expressed his melodic gift in small lyric pieces as well, some of them derived from other works that had not found their way in the world. The young Dvorák composed with great energy and enthusiasm long before the world began to beat a path to his door. Many of his early works were chamber compositions which he could have performed and heard (and taken part in himself, usually playing the viola). But he often reused in later years musical ideas that had first appeared in unpublished early works. Such is the case with the Romance in F minor. He had composed a string quartet in F in the early autumn of 1873, but when the leading chamber musicians of Prague rejected it for performance, he put it aside, saving only the slow movement, a piece of simple lyrical charm, which he later arranged for violin and orchestra. In that guise, as Opus 11, it has made its way into the world. It is far more than a simple rescoring of the quartet movement, for Dvorák reworked the material considerably, first for violin and piano, later for violin with small orchestra. Steven Ledbetter STEVEN LEDBETTER was program annotator of the Boston Symphony Orchestra from 1979 to 1998. THE FIRST BOSTON SYMPHONY PERFORMANCES of Dvorák’s F minor Romance for violin and orchestra took place on November 3 and 4, 1967, with soloist Itzhak Perlman under the direction of Erich Leinsdorf. The next BSO performance also featured Perlman, in Prague with Seiji Ozawa conducting in December 1993. Since then, there have been BSO performances with Isaac Stern (under Ozawa, in the Opening Night concert of the 1996-97 BSO season; Stern was also soloist for a TMC Orchestra performance led by Robert Spano at Tanglewood in July 1993, as part of that summer’s Leonard Bernstein Memorial Concert); Pinchas Zukerman (the most recent subscription performances, in March 1999, followed by a Tanglewood performance that August, all with Jeffrey Tate conducting); and Gil Shaham (at Tanglewood on July 13, 2002, with John Williams conducting, as part of a “Celebrating Seiji” concert marking Ozawa’s final appearances as BSO music director that summer). Antonín Dvorák

Violin Concerto in A minor, Opus 53 ANTONÍN DVORÁK was born in Nelahozeves (Mühlhausen), Bohemia, near Prague, on September 8, 1841, and died in Prague on May 1, 1904. He composed his Violin Concerto between July 5 and mid-September 1879, revising it in 1880 and then again two years later. The violinist Joseph Joachim gave a read-through of the work with Dvorák conducting the orchestra of the Berlin Hochschule in November 1882. Frantiˇsek Ondríˇcek was soloist for the premiere on October 14, 1883, in Prague, as well as for the Vienna premiere under Hans Richter on December 2, 1883 (in the same concert at which the Brahms Third Symphony was played for the first time). IN ADDITION TO THE SOLO VIOLIN, the score of Dvorák’s Violin Concerto calls for an orchestra of two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, timpani, and strings. On January 1, 1879, Joseph Joachim gave the first performance of the Brahms Violin Concerto. Brahms was one of the most important influences on the career of Antonín Dvorák, and it was for Joachim that Dvorák wrote his own Violin Concerto six months later. The Austro-Hungarian Joachim (1831-1907) was a composer, conductor, and teacher, as well as one of the most important violinists of his day. He made his debut at eight, was sent to study in Vienna several months after that, and in 1843 went to Leipzig to learn from Mendelssohn at the new conservatory there, making his Gewandhaus debut that August. On May 27, 1844, Mendelssohn conducted the Beethoven Violin Concerto in London with the thirteen-year-old Joachim as soloist; the enthusiastic audience was so taken with the blond youngster’s performance that the first movement was several times interrupted by applause. Six years later, Joachim was concertmaster under Franz Liszt at Weimar for the first production of Wagner’s Lohengrin. He became an intimate of Robert and Clara Schumann, and in 1853 he met Brahms, who benefited from Joachim’s advice on orchestration (Tovey reports that the latter’s skill in this area was considered “as on a level with his mastery of the violin”) and from hearing Joachim’s quartet perform his early chamber music. It soon became typical for Brahms to seek Joachim’s suggestions regarding works-in-progress, and in 1877 Joachim conducted the first English performance, at Cambridge, of Brahms’s First Symphony.* It was Brahms who introduced Dvorák to Joachim, and Joachim got to know Dvorák’s A major string sextet, Opus 48, and E-flat string quartet, Opus 51, both of which were performed at Joachim’s house in Berlin on July 29, 1879, with the composer present. By this time, and with encouragement from Joachim, who had recently given the first performance of Brahms’s Violin Concerto, Dvorák was at work on a violin concerto of his own. In January 1880 he reported that Joachim had promised to play the concerto as soon as it was published, and on May 9, 1880, after Joachim had suggested a thorough revision, the composer wrote to his publisher Simrock that he had reworked the entire score, “without missing a single bar.” Dvorák again gave the score to Joachim, who now took two years to respond, finally making alterations to the solo part in the summer of 1882 and suggesting that the composer lighten the instrumentation. In November the composer and Joachim read through the concerto with the orchestra of the Berlin Hochschule. The next month Dvorák held fast against criticism from Simrock’s adviser Robert Keller regarding the lack of a break before the Adagio: “...the first two movements can—or must—remain as they are.” Simrock published the score in 1883, but for the first performance the soloist was not Joachim but the twenty-three-year-old, Prague-born Frantiˇsek Ondríˇcek, who was already famous enough by this time to be receiving invitations to play throughout Europe, in the United States, and in eastern Russia. Joachim himself never performed Dvorák’s concerto—though he almost did so in London during the composer’s first visit there in 1884*—and it has been suggested that the violinist-composer may not have been able to reconcile his own conservatism vis-à-vis musical form with respect to Dvorák’s bold experimentation in the first movement. Even today, this neglected masterpiece has had comparatively few advocates, but probably for yet another reason: it is fiendishly difficult. Dvorák wastes no time in alerting us to the fact that he will adhere to no prescribed formal scheme in his first movement, by dispensing entirely with an orchestral exposition. Instead, a bold, unison forte with a suggestion of triple-time furiant rhythm serves to introduce the soloist before even five measures have gone by, the warmly melodic theme giving way to cadenza-like figuration (already!) before the orchestra reenters. The next important idea, a woodwind cantilena to be developed in short order by the soloist, grows naturally from the contours of the preceding orchestral material. What might be identified as the movement’s “real” second theme by virtue of its placement in C, the relative major of A minor, will appear in the solo violin only much later, and very briefly at that,

against a sort of free echo in the solo oboe. But note that the idea here is not so much to identify individual themes as to observe that Dvorák has created material so constantly ripe for elaboration that applying the terms “exposition” and “development” to this movement is almost meaningless. Ultimately, since so much has already happened, the “big” return to the main theme—the “recapitulation” if you must—really has nowhere to go, and Dvorák accordingly cuts things short with the suggestion of a brief cadenza (over forceful horn calls which appear in varying guises throughout the concerto) and then a contemplative bridge passage for winds and low strings—the soloist giving out one of many variants of the main theme heard during the movement—leading directly to the wonderfully expansive and beautiful F major Adagio. The length of the second movement is supported not only by Dvorák’s ability to create long-breathed arcs of melody, but also by his skill in juxtaposing areas of contrasting key and character as the movement proceeds. The concerto’s rondo finale is unflaggingly energetic, tuneful, and, to quote Michael Steinberg, “unabashedly Czech,” exploiting the folk-dance rhythms of the furiant in its A major main theme and the duple-time dumka in the D minor central episode. Dvorák is particularly inventive in his presentations of the main theme: it is heard first over high strings, with the second violins sustaining a tonic A; it returns against a crashing open fifth in the timpani and the simulation of Czech bagpipes in the open fifth of violins and cellos; and for its third appearance it sounds against a rush of upper-string activity with off-beat accents in the cellos and basses. For the dumka episode, Dvorák asks the timpanist to retune his E to D (other briefer instances of retuning occur occasionally in this score); this episode also stresses two-against-three cross-rhythms, particularly via the triplets of the horns heard against the steady 2/4 of the dumka theme. Near the end, there is a striking change of color when the solo flute brings back the main theme beginning on A-flat, and then a brief reference to the dumka prepares the exuberant final pages, a sudden accelerando and four brilliantly boisterous chords bringing this marvelous movement to a close. Marc Mandel MARC MANDEL is Director of Program Publications of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. THE FIRST AMERICAN PERFORMANCE of Dvorák’s Violin Concerto took place in Chicago on October 30, 1891, with soloist Max Bendix and the Chicago Orchestra under the direction of Theodore Thomas. THE FIRST BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA PERFORMANCE of the concerto was on November 17, 1900, with soloist Timothée Adamowski under the direction of Wilhelm Gericke. Subsequent BSO performances featured Mischa Elman (with Max Fiedler conducting), Sylvain Noack (with Karl Muck), Albert Spalding (Pierre Monteux), Ruth Posselt (Serge Koussevitzky and Richard Burgin), Isaac Stern and Shmuel Ashkenasi (both with Erich Leinsdorf), Edith Peinemann (Joseph Silverstein), Joseph Silverstein (Sergiu Comissiona), Shlomo Mintz (Esa-Pekka Salonen), Midori (Dennis Russell Davies), Frank Peter Zimmermann (Marek Janowski), Pamela Frank (Richard Westerfield and Seiji Ozawa), Ida Haendel (Andrew Davis), Midori again (Robert Spano), Hilary Hahn (the most recent Tanglewood performance, with Herbert Blomstedt on August 19, 2006), and, again, Frank Peter Zimmermann (the most recent subscription performances, in March 2012 with Juraj Valˇcuha conducting). * -Brahms and Joachim remained very close until the end of Joachim’s marriage in 1884 found Brahms siding with Amalie Joachim. He wrote his Double Concerto as something of a peace offering to Joachim in 1887; Joachim and his quartet cellist, Robert Hausmann, were the first soloists. * -August Manns, on whose concert series Joachim was appearing at the Crystal Palace, would have programmed the work had the composer been allowed to conduct, but Dvorák was in England under the auspices of the Philharmonic Society, which would not let him appear with the rival organization—especially since the Crystal Palace concert was to happen before the Philharmonic’s own! Ludwig van Beethoven Symphony No. 3 in E-flat, “Eroica” LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN was baptized in Bonn, Germany, on December 17, 1770, and died in Vienna on March 26, 1827. He composed his Third Symphony, the “Eroica,” between May and November 1803, with some further polishing early the following year. It was privately performed in the Vienna town house of Prince Joseph von Lobkowitz, to whom the score is dedicated, in the

summer of 1804. With Beethoven himself conducting, the first public performance took place on April 7, 1805, in Vienna, at the Theater-an-der-Wien. THE SCORE OF THE “EROICA” SYMPHONY calls for two each of flutes, oboes, clarinets, and bassoons, three horns, two trumpets, timpani, and strings. With Beethoven’s Third Symphony, as Maynard Solomon observes, “we know that we have crossed irrevocably a major boundary in Beethoven’s development and in musical history as well.” In its size and shape, in the density and complexity of its musical ideas, in its overall scope, in its psychologically complex link to extramusical associations (i.e., the Napoleon connection), it was worlds apart from any symphony written before it. The first movement alone, when the exposition repeat is included, runs half the length of an entire late Mozart or Haydn symphony. The funeral march represented an unprecedented novelty and was frequently mentioned along with the title; in February 1814, for a performance by the Philharmonic Society in London, the symphony was announced quite specifically as Beethoven’s “Sinfonia Eroica (containing the Funeral March).” Of the third movement, with its bustling energy, beginning “sempre pianissimo staccato,” George Grove wrote that “before this...the Scherzo, in its full sense, was unknown to music.” Also in the Eroica Beethoven introduced a third horn to the symphony orchestra for the first time; the third-movement Trio takes full advantage of the added sonority. The theme-and-variations finale—based on a musical idea also encountered in a pre-1802 Beethoven contredanse for piano, in the finale of his ballet music to The Creatures of Prometheus (1800-1801), and again in his Opus 35 piano variations of 1802 (retroactively christened the Eroica Variations)—can still seem curious, a source of puzzlement; one commentator has even described it as “perhaps a little naïve,” given the weight of what precedes. Beethoven was aware of the strain the Eroica would have placed on listeners in his day. A note in the first printed edition stated that “This Symphony, being purposely written at greater length than usual, should be played nearer the beginning than the end of a concert...lest, if it be heard too late, when the audience is fatigued by the previous pieces, it should lose its proper and intended effect.” At one point he considered eliminating the exposition repeat in the first movement—presumably in the hope that such shortening would encourage more frequent performance, although the inclusion of the repeat could only have helped early audiences to make sense of the first movement’s musical argument. An early review, of a semi-public performance in January 1805 (the first public performance was conducted by Beethoven himself on April 7 that year), commented on the symphony’s “inordinate length and extreme difficulty of execution” and observed that “the work seems often to lose itself in utter confusion.” Yet also in early 1805, when the work’s dedicatee, Beethoven’s patron, Prince Joseph von Lobkowitz, who had purchased personal rights to performance of the symphony for a six-month period, arranged a hearing for an esteemed guest, Prince Louis Ferdinand of Prussia, the latter was so fascinated by the new work that it was played through a second and third time that same evening! In January 1807, when the Eroica was first heard at the concerts of the Leipzig Gewandhaus, the distribution of a program intended to assist comprehension—“A fiery and splendid Allegro; (2) a sublime and solemn Funeral March; (3) an impetuous Scherzando; (4) a grand Finale in the strict style” (this referring to the last movement’s theme-and-variations structure)—not only helped ensure a receptive audience but even led to requests for further performances. The following anecdote, recorded by Beethoven’s friend Ferdinand Ries, has become crucial to any consideration of the Eroica Symphony: In this symphony Beethoven had Buonaparte in mind, but as he was when he was First Consul. Beethoven esteemed him greatly at the time and likened him to the greatest Roman consuls. I as well as several of his more intimate friends saw a copy of the score lying upon his table with the word “Buonaparte” at the extreme top of the title page, and at the extreme bottom “Luigi van Beethoven,” but not another word. Whether and with what the space between was to be filled out, I do not know. I was the first to bring him the intelligence that Buonaparte had proclaimed himself emperor, whereupon he flew into a rage and cried out: “Is he then, too, nothing more than an ordinary human being? Now he, too, will trample on all the rights of man and indulge only his ambition. He will exalt himself above all others, become a tyrant!” Beethoven went to the table, took hold of the title page by the top, tore it in two, and threw it on the floor. The first page was rewritten and only then did the symphony receive the title Sinfonia eroica. While the intent of this account is clear, the actual details cannot be substantiated. Beethoven composed his Third Symphony between May and November 1803, completing the work with some

final polishing early in 1804.* But the title Eroica seems not to have been used until the parts were first published, in October 1806, with the heading “Sinfonia Eroica composta per festigiare il Souvenire di un grand’ Uomo” (“Heroic Symphony composed to celebrate the memory of a great man”). The autograph of the symphony—which may have been the score mentioned by Ries—is lost. A surviving manuscript, written out by a copyist and headed “Sinfonia Grande Intitulata Bonaparte,” has the last two of these words energetically crossed out on the title page—but the words “Geschrieben auf Bonaparte” (“written on Bonaparte”), added in Beethoven’s own hand, remain. In October 1803, Ries wrote to the publisher Simrock in Bonn that Beethoven wanted very much to dedicate the new symphony to Napoleon, but that, on the other hand, Prince Lobkowitz was interested in purchasing the performing rights—under which circumstance the latter would become dedicatee, and Beethoven would simply name the work after Napoleon. A practical consideration was that Beethoven, frequently ambivalent toward Vienna, and himself considering a move to Paris, would have found a symphony named for or dedicated to Napoleon a useful calling card. Napoleon declared himself Emperor on May 18, 1804; yet even on August 26 that year, Beethoven wrote to the publisher Breitkopf & Härtel that “The title of the symphony is really Bonaparte.” But Beethoven’s apparent need somehow to express his political and ideological beliefs at this particular moment— whether in the dedication of the symphony or perhaps even in the language of the music itself—had also to be tempered by realistic concerns, especially given the strained relations between France and Austria at the time. Ultimately, the music must speak for itself; indeed, as Basil Lam has written, “the greatest human hero would be unworthy of the Eroica.” Some things worthy of particular attention in the first movement: 1) those two slashing initial chords, which define the home key, serve as a springboard for the rhythmic energy of the entire movement, and are perceptible even in the movement’s closing cadence*; 2) the harmonically intrusive C-sharp with which the first statement of the main theme ends, and which sets up a harmonic tension to be felt throughout the movement as a whole; 3) the increased proportions of the development and coda sections in this gigantically expanded sonata-form structure; 4) the complex network of thematic materials, not one of them a real “tune”; 5) the famous appearance of the so-called “new theme” in the development section; and 6) the “overeager” horn entrance (over a “wrong” harmony) that ushers in the recapitulation. The funeral march, with its integral use of silence and sound, and the energetic third-movement scherzo—the first symphonic “scherzo” actually to be so named—need no further comment. But the finale requires at least a little space, if only because of its rather unusual structure (the “strict style” mentioned in the 1807 program quoted earlier), its basis—at least to begin—in a clearly defined, purely musical technique (theme and variations) quite different from the more extroverted, even revolutionary musical expression of the first movement, and from the more explicitly personal utterance of the second. An awareness of Beethoven’s tempo designation is particularly important here: when this movement is treated as a real “Allegro molto,” its astonishing musical craftsmanship becomes all the more apparent. At the same time, a quick tempo helps speed the musical argument to its intended conclusion. The fugal section brings a new character, suggesting a grander mode of expression, and music that becomes increasingly forceful. Then, with the Poco Andante, there is a humanizing quality, a poignancy, and, to quote Tovey, “a mood we have not found before in the whole symphony.” This transfiguring and humanizing element is clearly the key to the finale, and provides the subliminal link to the Eroica’s first two movements. Once regained, this element of personalization demands a triumphant close, and the music speeds to its end in joyful celebration of its newly-restored humanity. Marc Mandel THE FIRST AMERICAN PERFORMANCE OF THE “EROICA” WITH FULL ORCHESTRA took place in the inaugural season of the Philharmonic Society in New York, on February 18, 1843, with Ureli Corelli Hill conducting (an arrangement for septet having apparently been heard in the United States as early as 1828). The first Boston performance of the “Eroica” took place on May 5, 1849, in Tremont Temple, with George Webb conducting the Musical Fund Society. THE FIRST BOSTON SYMPHONY PERFORMANCE OF THE “EROICA” was led by Georg Henschel in November 1881, on the fifth program of the orchestra’s inaugural season, subsequent BSO performances being given by Wilhelm Gericke, Arthur Nikisch, Emil Paur, Karl Muck, Max Fiedler, Ernst Schmidt, Henri Rabaud, Pierre Monteux, Serge Koussevitzky, Vladimir Golschmann, Richard Burgin, Bruno Walter, Charles Munch, Carl Schuricht, Eugene Ormandy, Erich Leinsdorf,

Jean Martinon, Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, Max Rudolf, William Steinberg, Claudio Abbado, Colin Davis, Ferdinand Leitner, Seiji Ozawa, Klaus Tennstedt, Edo de Waart, Kurt Masur, Leonard Bernstein, Michael Tilson Thomas, Marek Janowski, Christoph Eschenbach, Simon Rattle, Herbert Blomstedt, Julian Kuerti, James Levine (including the most recent subscription performances, in February 2010), and Christoph von Dohnányi (including the most recent Tanglewood performance, on August 19, 2011). * -Sketches for the first three movements of a symphony in E-flat (rather different in outline from the Eroica itself) actually date back to the summer or fall of 1802, in a sketchbook also including notations for the Opus 35 piano variations. The musicologist Lewis Lockwood has gone so far as to suggest that Beethoven may already have had a theme-and-variations finale in mind at this point, and that no sketches for the finale appear because the idea may be inferred from the proximity of the symphony sketches to those for Opus 35. * -Beethoven’s first two symphonies had begun with slow introductions, as would the Fourth and Seventh. To Read and Hear More... John Clapham’s Dvorák article from the 1980 edition of The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians was reprinted in The New Grove Late Romantic Masters: Bruckner, Brahms, Dvorák, Wolf (Norton paperback). Clapham is also the author of two books about the composer: Antonín Dvorák: Musician and Craftsman (St. Martin’s) and the more purely biographical Antonín Dvorák (Norton). The article on the composer in the 2001 edition of The New Grove is by Klaus Döge. Also of interest are Alec Robertson’s Dvorák in the Master Musicians series (Littlefield paperback) and Robert Layton’s BBC Music Guide on Dvorák Symphonies & Concertos (University of Washington paperback). Dvorák and his World, a collection of essays and documentary material edited by Michael Beckerman, draws upon recent research and also includes translations from important Czech sources (Princeton). Otakar Šourek published important source material on Dvorák’s life in Antonín Dvorák: Letters and Reminiscences (Artia). Further discussion of the Violin Concerto can be found in A Guide to the Concerto, edited by Robert Layton, in Robert Simpson’s chapter on “The Concerto After Beethoven” (Oxford paperback). Anne-Sophie Mutter has recorded Dvorák’s Violin Concerto and F minor Romance with Manfred Honeck and the Berlin Philharmonic (Deutsche Grammophon). There are two Boston Symphony Orchestra recordings of the Romance in F minor: with Itzhak Perlman under Erich Leinsdorf’s direction, from 1967 (RCA), and with Perlman under Seiji Ozawa’s direction, recorded live in Prague in 1993 (Sony). Other recordings of the concerto (listed alphabetically by soloist) feature Julia Fischer with David Zinman and the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich (Decca), Pamela Frank with Sir Charles Mackerras and the Czech Philharmonic (London), Itzhak Perlman with Daniel Barenboim and the London Philharmonic (EMI), former BSO concertmaster Joseph Silverstein as soloist and conductor with the Utah Symphony Orchestra (Pro Arte), Josef Suk with the Czech Philharmonic under the direction of Václav Neumann and also under the direction of Karel Anˇcerl (both on Supraphon), Christian Tezlaff with Libor Pešek and the Czech Philharmonic (Virgin Classics), Maxim Vengerov with Kurt Masur and the New York Philharmonic (Teldec), and Frank Peter Zimmermann with Franz Welser-Möst and the London Philharmonic (EMI). Other recordings of the Romance in F minor feature (again alphabetically by soloist) Pamela Frank (paired with the Violin Concerto), Gil Shaham, Isaac Stern, Josef Suk (paired with the Violin Concerto), and Pinchas Zukerman. Edmund Morris’s Beethoven: The Universal Composer is a thoughtful, first-rate compact biography aimed at the general reader (Harper Perennial paperback, in the series “Eminent Lives”). The important full-scale modern biographies, both titled simply Beethoven, are by Maynard Solomon (Schirmer paperback) and Barry Cooper (Oxford University Press, in the “Master Musicians” series). Noteworthy, too, are Jan Swafford’s chapter on Beethoven in The Vintage Guide to Classical Music (Vintage paperback); Richard Osborne’s chapter on Beethoven in A Guide to the Symphony, edited by Robert Layton (Oxford paperback); and Beethoven: The Music and the Life, by the Harvard-based Beethoven authority Lewis Lockwood (Norton paperback). The Beethoven Compendium: A Guide to Beethoven’s Life and Music, edited by Barry Cooper (Thames & Hudson paperback), and Peter Clive’s Beethoven and his World: A Biographical Dictionary (Oxford), are particularly useful

references. Dating from the nineteenth century, but still crucial, is Thayer’s Life of Beethoven as revised and updated by Elliot Forbes (Princeton paperback). Michael Steinberg’s program notes on all nine Beethoven symphonies are in his compilation volume The Symphony–A Listener’s Guide (Oxford paperback). Donald Francis Tovey’s notes on the symphonies are among his Essays in Musical Analysis (Oxford). Among much older books, still worth investigating are George Grove’s classic Beethoven and his Nine Symphonies, now more than a century old (Dover paperback), and J.W.N. Sullivan’s Beethoven: His Spiritual Development, published in 1927, but still fascinating and thought-provoking not only as a reflection of its day but for what’s relevant to our own (Vintage paperback). The Boston Symphony Orchestra recorded the complete cycle of Beethoven symphonies with Erich Leinsdorf between 1962 and 1969 for RCA; the Eroica was Leinsdorf’s first recording as BSO music director. Earlier BSO recordings of the Eroica were made by Serge Koussevitzky in 1945 and Charles Munch in 1957 (also for RCA). Noteworthy Beethoven symphony cycles of varying vintage include (alphabetically by conductor) Claudio Abbado’s with the Berlin Philharmonic (Deutsche Grammophon), Daniel Barenboim’s with the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra (Decca), John Eliot Gardiner’s with the period-instrument Orchestre Révolutionaire et Romantique (Deutsche Grammophon Archiv), Bernard Haitink’s live with the London Symphony Orchestra (LSO Live), Nikolaus Harnoncourt’s with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe (Warner Classics), Philippe Herreweghe’s with the Royal Flemish Philharmonic (PentaTone), Herbert von Karajan’s with the Berlin Philharmonic (Deutsche Grammophon, preferably their cycle issued originally in 1963), Christian Thielemann’s with the Vienna Philharmonic (Sony), and Osmo Vänskä’s with the Minnesota Orchestra (BIS). Single-disc choices for the Eroica include Christoph von Dohnányi’s with the Cleveland Orchestra (Telarc) and more recently with the Philharmonia Orchestra (Signum Classics) and James Levine’s with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra (Deutsche Grammophon). Collectors will also aim toward vintage recordings led by Wilhelm Furtwängler with the Berlin Philharmonic and Vienna Philharmonic, and Arturo Toscanini with the NBC Symphony Orchestra (various labels). Marc Mandel Guest Artists Manfred Honeck Manfred Honeck has served as music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra since the 200809 season and has extended his contract through the 2019-20 season. His work in Pittsburgh has been captured on CD by the Japanese label Exton, in acclaimed recordings of Mahler symphonies 1, 3, 4 (an ICMA 2012 Award-winner), and 5, Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5, and Strauss’s Ein Heldenleben. He and the orchestra have toured regularly, annual tour performances since 2010 taking them to numerous European music capitals and festivals, among them the Rheingau Festival, Schleswig-Holstein, Beethovenfest Bonn, Musikfest Berlin, Grafenegg, Lucerne, and the BBC Proms. Their 2012 tour included a week-long residency at Vienna’s Musikverein; in 2013 they performed in Grafenegg, Berlin, Bucharest, Paris, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Lucerne, and Bonn. From 2007 to 2011 Mr. Honeck was music director of the Staatsoper Stuttgart, where he conducted numerous productions including Berlioz’s Les Troyens, Mozart’s Idomeneo, Verdi’s Aida, Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier, Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmélites, and Wagner’s Lohengrin and Parsifal, as well as numerous symphonic concerts. Operatic guest appearances include Semperoper Dresden, Komische Oper Berlin, Théâtre de la Monnaie in Brussels, Royal Opera of Copenhagen, the White Nights Festival in St. Petersburg, and the Salzburg Festival. Born in Austria, Manfred Honeck received his musical training at the Academy of Music in Vienna. His experience for several years as a member of the Vienna Philharmonic and Vienna State Opera Orchestra, and as conductor of Vienna’s Jeunesse Orchestra, has given his conducting a distinctive stamp. He began his career as assistant to Claudio Abbado in Vienna and was subsequently engaged by the Zurich Opera House, where he received the European Conductor’s Award in 1993. He served as one of three main conductors of the MDR Symphony Orchestra in Leipzig, and for a year as music director of Norwegian National Opera in Oslo. Following a highly successful tour of Europe, he was appointed principal guest conductor of the Oslo Philharmonic for several years. He was music director of the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra in Stockholm from 2000 to 2006; from 2008 to 2011 he was principal guest conductor of the Czech Philharmonic, a position he has resumed for another three

years beginning this season. As a guest conductor he has worked with such major international orchestras as the Bavarian Radio Symphony, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Staatskapelle Dresden, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, London Symphony, Orchestre de Paris, Accademia di Santa Cecilia Rome, Vienna Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Cleveland Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, and Boston Symphony Orchestra. A regular guest at the Verbier Festival, he has been artistic director of the International Concerts Wolfegg in Germany for more than fifteen years. In February 2013 he made his successful Berlin Philharmonic debut, resulting in a Deutsche Grammophon recording with Anne-Sophie Mutter of works by Dvorák. 2013-14 brings return engagements in Bamberg, New York, Los Angeles, Boston, and Rome, as well as his Philadelphia Orchestra debut. His return to Boston this week follows his subscription series debut with a program of Beethoven, Schnittke, and Tchaikovsky in November 2005. Anne-Sophie Mutter For more than thirty-five years, violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter has sustained a career of exceptional musicianship combined with an unwavering commitment to the future of classical music. Since her international debut at the Lucerne Festival in 1976, followed by a solo appearance with Herbert von Karajan at the Salzburg Festival, Ms. Mutter has appeared in the major concert halls of Europe, North and South America, and Asia. Besides performing and recording established masterpieces, she is an avid champion of 20th- and 21st-century violin repertoire in both orchestral and chamber music settings; she has had works composed for her by Sebastian Currier, Henri Dutilleux, Sofia Gubaidulina, Witold Lutosławski, Norbert Moret, Krzysztof Penderecki, Sir André Previn, and Wolfgang Rihm. Her 2014 concert performances in Australia, Asia, Europe, and North America focus on the violin concertos of Brahms, Bruch, Dvorák, and Mozart. She is conductor-soloist with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra in Mozart’s violin concertos 2, 3, and 5; and at the Wolfegg Festival she performs Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 5 and his Sinfonia concertante, K.364, joined in the latter by seventeen-year-old Korean violist Hwayoon Lee, a scholarship student of the Anne-Sophie Mutter Foundation. Ms. Mutter performs Dvorák’s Violin Concerto in London with the London Symphony conducted by Michael Francis, in Washington with the National Symphony and Cristian Macelaru, in Boston with the BSO under Manfred Honeck, and at Tanglewood with the BSO and Andris Nelsons. She performs the Brahms concerto in Paris, Vienna, Luxembourg, and several German cities with the City of Birmingham Orchestra and Andris Nelsons, and in Baden-Baden with the Berlin Philharmonic and Simon Rattle. Ms. Mutter and pianist Lambert Orkis mark the twenty-fifth anniversary of their musical partnership with recitals in Germany, France, and Switzerland, featuring Previn’s Violin Sonata No. 2 and Penderecki’s La Follia for solo violin, both especially composed for Ms. Mutter, and works by Mozart and Beethoven. At year’s end the duo performs a Carnegie Hall recital featuring works by Kreisler, Webern, Grieg, Previn, and Franck. Ms. Mutter will open the Pittsburgh Symphony’s 2014-15 season with Bruch’s Violin Concerto No. 1 conducted by Manfred Honeck; she also performs that work in Madrid and Barcelona with Miguel Harth-Bedoya and the National Orchestra of Spain, and in New York with Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic. Next November brings her third international tour, this time to North America, with “Mutter’s Virtuosi,” an ensemble made up of fourteen current and former scholarship students of the Anne-Sophie Mutter Foundation. She also gives a benefit concert for Lebenshilfe, an organization that supports people with intellectual disabilities and their relatives. Ms. Mutter’s many recordings have earned awards internationally. She recently released her first recording of Dvorák’s Violin Concerto on Deutsche Grammophon, with Manfred Honeck leading the Berlin Philharmonic. To mark the thirty-fifth anniversary of her stage debut, Deutsche Grammophon released a comprehensive box set with all of her DG recordings, extensive documentation, and previously unpublished rarities. Among many other honors, she most recently became a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences and was awarded the Order of the Lutosławski Society in Warsaw. Since her BSO debut in February 1983 under Seiji Ozawa, Anne-Sophie Mutter has appeared many times with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, in Boston, New York, and at Tanglewood. With the BSO she has recorded André Previn’s Violin Concerto (Anne-Sophie) and Double Concerto for Violin, Double Bass, and Orchestra with the composer conducting, and Bartók’s Violin Concerto No. 2 and Norbert Moret’s En Rêve with Seiji Ozawa conducting, all on Deutsche Grammophon. Her most recent Symphony Hall appearances with the BSO were as violinist-conductor to open the 2011-12 season with the five

Mozart violin concertos. More recently, in July 2012 at Tanglewood, she was soloist-conductor with the BSO for Mozart’s violin concertos 2, 3, and 5, also appearing as soloist in Sarasate’s Carmen Fantasy with Andris Nelsons and the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra in the gala Tanglewood 75th Celebration subsequently issued on DVD.