Rep for Plebs

Updated 4/14/19

Growing up, I played the violin well, but never focused developing an understanding of classical music beyond that. As a result, I am now woefully incompetent at recognizing famous pieces. Trying to learn what your friends expect you to already know can be embarrassing and trying to learn in general (there’s a lot of classical music) can be intimidating. Both of these things have held me back for a couple of years, but now I’m making an effort to develop my repertoire knowledge by doing light touches of research into the things I hear.

4/8/19 — SAINT-SAENS “The Swan” from The Carnival of the Animals

Some members of the audience signed in approval when Capucon announced that he and Wang would be playing a piece by Saint-Saens for their first encore. I was one of those people, but only because I know and love Danse Macabre. #pleb

As soon as they started playing, alarm bells went off in my head though because I had actually heard the piece before. Granted, I did have to search “Saint-Saens cello piano” to figure out what it was, but as soon as I saw The Swan, I knew

The Swan is the 13th and penultimate movement of The Carnival of the Animals, which was written in 1886. It is the only movement that Saint-Saens allowed to be published in his lifetime, as he regarded the suite entire to be for fun and feared its release would damage his reputation as a serious composer. The piece was originally written for two pianos and cello; the pianos’ broken chords being water that react to the swan’s movement, which is heard through the cello’s gliding melody.

The piece is sometimes referred to as The Dying Swan after a line in a poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, who also wrote something I have been shamefully attributing to Shakespeare: “Tis better to have loved and lost / Than never to have loved at all". #pleb

When referred to as The Dying Swan, it is usually in the context of a short ballet. Russian choreographer/dancer Michel Fokine choreographed it for Anna Pavlova, who first performed it in 1905 and then about 4,000 times throughout her career. The pièce d’occasion for a gala at Noblemen’s Hall in Saint Petersburg, Russia follows the last four minutes of a swan’s life.

2/6/19 — SZYMANOWSKI “La Fontaine d’Arethuse” from Mythes for Violin and Piano, Op. 30

This piece was the second encore Kavakos and Wang played. There was a palpable change in the energy of the room when they did. The audience was hushed, as if under a spell. We feared that making noise would break the magic.

Karol Szymanowski (1882–1937) is a Polish, early 20th century composer. He wrote “The Fountain of Arethusa” in 1915. In Greek mythology, Arethusa was a nymph who, to avoid the advances of the river god Alpheus, was transformed into a stream that flowed beneath the sea and rose as a freshwater spring on the island of Ortygia.