Faces of Humanity: Fanfare Fantastique for Symphony Orchestra

Tonight’s performance of Faces of Humanity is a world premiere by Emmy award-winning composer John Wineglass, who took inspiration from the changing nature of Sacramento during a residency in our city. Wineglass’s Fanfare transcends the conception of this musical genre as a brief and brassy flourish. He describes his Fanfare as a tableau in two parts, which celebrates our reemergence on the other side of the COVID-19 pandemic—as well as a reminder to be vigilant and not repeat our past mistakes. Wineglass’s music, particularly his Unburied, Unmourned, Unmarked: Requiem for Rice, and Alone Together for percussion harp and strings, has struck a chord with audiences in unpacking the events of the last few years.

The first part of Faces of Humanity, titled “Disturbia: Pandemia,” can be described as chaotic and unpredictable, shifting meter constantly and rife with syncopation. Note the insistent typewriter-like ostinato in the percussion and strings, suggestive of a panicked media frenzy, set against looming, ominous brass. Moving into the second half, “Resilience: Vigilance,” a gradual transition into a more unified and glorious sound takes place. The piece ends in a flash of triumphant brilliance, showcasing a wide array of orchestral colors. The piece is brief but filled with excitement, joyously ringing in a new season of music for the Sacramento Philharmonic & Opera.

Violin Concerto in D Major

This Violin Concerto is the result of extensive collaboration between jazz luminary Wynton Marsalis and virtuoso violinist Nicola Benedetti. In 2015, Benedetti and the London Symphony Orchestra premiered the work, which has since established itself in the repertoire of major orchestras worldwide. It both chronicles and embraces the rich artistic heritage of jazz and symphonic collaborations, creating a piece of exceptional scope, color, and meaning that draws deep from emotional wells of a broader human experience.

The piece breaks with several traditions in delivering its message. Gone is the typical three-movement concerto structure, as the work swells to a full four symphonic movements. One may contrast it with George Gershwin’s 1924 Rhapsody in Blue, another celebrated jazz-symphonic hybrid, which did the exact opposite: condensing the concerto form into a comparatively brief twenty-minute package. Throughout, the soloist and orchestra musicians must also change between grooves on a moment’s notice, many of which are not standard to Western classical music, greatly compounding the piece’s overall difficulty.

Wynton Marsalis’s original liner notes, given here in quotation, express the essence of each movement beautifully:

“Movement 1, Rhapsody, is a complex dream that becomes a nightmare, progresses into peacefulness and dissolves into ancestral memory.” The concerto begins at dusk. The violin weaves a nocturnal lullaby-like melody as we descend into dreams. Hints of a swaying Habanera emerge, gradually blossoming before suffering under a brutal march heralded by a piercing police whistle. An extended violin solo meanders through swaths of blues harmonies and warm, dreamy orchestral textures. Percussion and strings gradually pick up a groove accompanied by subtly stomping feet as the piece dissolves. Marsalis calls this moment an “ancestral dance,” evocative of a fireside meeting between ancient peoples, bonding with improvisation and storytelling under gleaming stars. In terms of form, a sharp listener might hear the rhapsodic first movement functioning as a condensed version of the entire concerto. The nightmarish march becomes the ever-unpredictable burlesque of the second movement, the extended solo greatly expands to move into the third movement’s blues, and the ancestral dance is developed into the energetic overflowing final movement, a hootenanny.

“Movement 2, Rondo Burlesque, is a syncopated, New Orleans jazz, calliope, circus clown, African gumbo, Mardi Gras party in odd meters. Various grooves float by as we drift in and out of the wild festivities.” Eventually, the texture thins, and after a light-footed encounter with some percussionists the soloist is left alone, the melancholy sets in, and a solitary bluesy cadenza begins to mark our transition into the third movement.

“Movement 3, Blues, is the progression of flirtation, courtship, intimacy, sermonizing, final loss and abject loneliness that is out there to claim us all.” Listen for the sounds of a gospel congregation halfway through the movement, marked by a glorious tambourine and trombone chorus. The violin, in strident octaves, takes the role of ecstatic preacher. The movement ends in meditative peace.

“Movement 4, Hootenanny, is a raucous, stomping, and whimsical barnyard throw-down. She excites us with all types of virtuosic chicanery and gets us intoxicated with revelry and then … goes on down the Good King’s highway to other places yet to be seen or even foretold.” The 4th movement wakes us immediately with a rousing stomp-clap from the orchestra. Nicola Benedetti warns, “you’re partying for your life in this movement.” Listen for the soloist and orchestra “trading fours,” a type of jazz improvisation where two artists will take turns improvising in brief four-measure sections. As the violin showcases virtuosic techniques, the orchestra alternates between different styles of accompaniment, which whirls wildly between jazz and symphonic present, past, and future. These trade-offs accelerate until we reach a climax, which then mesmerizingly vanishes on the horizon.

The “Firebird” Suite (1919 version)

The Firebird was the first in a series of fruitful collaborations between rising-star composer Igor Stravinsky and the Russian impresario Sergei Diaghilev, head of the Ballets Russes. Diaghilev had unsuccessfully approached five other composers for music for the ballet before turning to Stravinsky. Fortunately, Stravinsky had anticipated the commission and had already begun working on the music. French critics and the public enthusiastically received the 1910 premiere of this patchwork tale of Russian Folklore and its dazzling fantasy of orchestral color. Tonight’s musical suite, re-touched by Stravinsky in 1919, is a distillation of the ballet’s essence, which unquestionably stands on its own musical merit.

The story begins with the ballet’s protagonist, Ivan, as he approaches the castle of Katschei, an ogre and sorcerer who terrorizes the villagers in his magical realm (“Introduction”). The rolled bass drum, muted basses, and moody comments in the winds capture Ivan’s apprehension. In the castle’s garden, Ivan encounters the legendary Firebird (“Variation”). The creature flits and skitters around, its movements captured by the deft acrobatics of the piccolo, flute, clarinet, and strings. Ivan captures the bird, and in exchange for her freedom, she bestows him with a magic feather that will summon her when he needs her.

Ivan then happens upon the twelve princesses held captive by Katschei (“Round of the Princesses”). He watches their beautiful dance and falls in love with one of them. Signaled by an oboe solo with harp accompaniment, the dance begins as the strings take over the pastoral melody. Notable in this movement are the carefully worked rotations of color as the melody passes between different sections of the orchestra. Stravinsky’s diligent study under his teacher Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov doubtlessly helped bring this ethereal world to life through music. The music winds down until it suddenly rockets forward into the next movement with the famously surprising ‘Firebird Hit.’

Katshcei’s minions attack Ivan, prompting him to use his magic feather. The Firebird appears and curses his pursuers, who savagely dance themselves to the point of exhaustion (“Infernal Dance”). The startling rhythms, changes of meter, and the ever-syncopated gestures leave us chaotically spinning throughout the movement. Finally, the Firebird lulls Katschei to sleep with a plaintive and then lush Berceuse, beginning with what is perhaps the most well-known bassoon solo in the repertoire. “Song of Deliverance,” ushered in with the noble French horn solo, leads seamlessly into the finale. The sorcerer’s spell is broken, and his petrified victims are brought to life. Ivan takes his new lover into his arms as the piece arrives at a victorious conclusion.

Paul Salzberg, Sacramento State School of Music