The Rhythms of Beethoven, Rossini, and Akiho
What to listen for
Overture to The Barber of Seville: abrupt shifts of moods and dynamics (how loud and soft the music is). Fans of Bugs Bunny will recognize this music from the classic 1950 cartoon, “Rabbit of Seville.”
Concerto for Cello and Orchestra: listen for long horizontal expressive phrases in the cello, and subtle shifts in rhythmic patterns.
Symphony No. 7: Listen to the ways Beethoven develops the second movement’s repeated rhythmic motif: (DAH-da-da-DAH-DAH).
Other works by these composers
Rossini: Overture to William Tell; Overture to L’italiana in Algeri (The Italian Girl in Algiers)
Akiho: Seven Pillars, Beneath Lighted Coffers
Beethoven: Symphony No. 6, “Pastoral;” Symphony No. 5
Gioachino Rossini: Overture to Il barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville)
Composer: born February 29, 1792, Pesaro, Italy; died November 13, 1868, Passy, France
Work composed: This overture was originally written for Rossini’s 1813 opera Aureliano in Palmira; Rossini repurposed it as the overture to The Barber of Seville at that opera’s premiere on February 20, 1816, at the Teatro Argento in Rome.
World premiere: The Barber of Seville premiered on February 20, 1816, at the Teatro Argento in Rome.
Instrumentation: 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, trombone, timpani, cymbals, bass drum and strings
Estimated duration: 8 minutes
Gioachino Rossini composed more than 40 operas during his lifetime; today he is best known for just one. The timeless comedy of The Barber of Seville, based on a play by the French writer Beaumarchais, overcame its disastrous premiere to become Rossini’s most popular opera, both during the composer’s lifetime and in the years since his death. Many concertgoers will also recognize Rossini’s overture from the classic Bugs Bunny cartoon, Rabbit of Seville.
In Rossini’s time, opera overtures bore little musical relationship to the operas themselves. The overture served as a musical signal for the audience that the evening’s entertainment was about to begin; its musical content might suggest some of the emotional range of the opera, but did not include any actual themes. Rossini, like Mozart before him, usually left the overture until last. In the case of The Barber of Seville, Rossini ran out of time before the opera’s scheduled premiere, so he borrowed an overture from his opera seria, Aureliano in Palmira, which had premiered two years earlier. In 1815, a year before the premiere of The Barber of Seville, Rossini recycled it for the first time as the overture to his historical opera Elisabetta, regina d’Inghilterra (Elizabeth, Queen of England).
Andy Akiho: Concerto for Cello and Orchestra
Composer: born February 7, 1979, Columbia, SC
Work composed: 2024. Written for cellist Jeffrey Zeigler and co-commissioned by the Bozeman Symphony
World premiere: Alasdair Neale led the Sun Valley Festival Chamber Orchestra with cellist Jeffrey Zeigler on August 2, 2024, at the Sun Valley Pavilion in Sun Valley, ID
Instrumentation: solo cello, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, 2 trombones, tuba, timpani, keyboard, harp, and strings
Estimated duration: 21 minutes
Reviewers often use the word “eclectic” to describe composer Andy Akiho’s music, and for good reason. A Bozeman Symphony audience favorite, Akiho’s music embodies the diverse sound world of his percussion experiences: high school marching bands; elite-level drum corps; West African marimba music; Trinidadian steel pan music; and the contemporary classical music scene in New York City.
For the past 15 years, Akiho has focused on exploring timbre (instrumental colors); timbres are a logical compositional entry point for a percussionist. In this concerto, written for Akiho’s friend and colleague, cellist Jeffrey Zeigler, Akiho is setting off into what for him is uncharted territory: long, expressive legato phrases that are hallmarks of the cello’s standard repertoire. “Jeff comes out of a much more typical classical music education than I do,” Akiho explains. (Zeigler earned a Bachelor of Music degree from the Eastman School of Music, a Master of Music degree from the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University, and continued his studies at Indiana University under the legendary cellist Janos Starker. From 2005-13, Zeigler was the cellist for the world-renowned Kronos Quartet.) “Jeff’s expressive way with lyrical lines has a soaring, sometimes even haunting quality. That’s a challenge for me, a composer who is more articulate with timbres. I definitely want to challenge Jeff, while focusing on his strengths, and I definitely want to challenge myself while still maintaining my [musical] identity vocabulary, even as I’m stretching that vocabulary beyond my usual percussion comfort zone. That’s probably the most difficult thing.”
The concerto, untitled as of this writing, has multiple movements, and this being an Akiho work, is grounded in rhythmic concepts. “One of my professors at the Manhattan School of Music used the expression ‘off by one’ to describe music from the standard repertoire that would establish a musical idea – [for example, the da-da-da-DUH rhythm Beethoven used throughout his Fifth Symphony] and then tweak the rhythm slightly so that it is still recognizable but altered. It didn’t follow the rules exactly,” Akiho continues. “Something would be ‘off by one.’ I’m interpreting ‘off by one’ literally, shifting patterns by one or two or multiple beats. Hearing this is like viewing a Calder mobile; you’re seeing [hearing] the same thing from different perspectives.”
Ludwig van Beethoven: Symphony No. 7 in A major, Op. 92
Composer: born December 16, 1770, Bonn; died March 26, 1827, Vienna
Work composed: begun in the fall of 1811; completed in April 1812
World premiere: Beethoven conducted the premiere on December 8, 1813, at the University of Vienna, in a benefit concert for Bavarian soldiers injured in the Napoleonic wars.
Instrumentation: 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, and strings.
Estimated duration: 36 minutes
Ludwig van Beethoven’s hearing had been diminishing since the early 1800s; by the winter of 1813, when he conducted the Seventh Symphony’s premiere, he was all but completely deaf. To compensate, Beethoven adopted an idiosyncratic conducting style, described by his colleague Louis Spohr: “Whenever a sforzando occurred, he tore his arms, previously crossed upon his breast, asunder with great vehemence. At piano[s] he crouched down lower and lower according to the degree of softness he desired. If a crescendo then entered he gradually rose again, and at the entrance to the forte he jumped into the air. Sometimes, too, he unconsciously shouted to strengthen the forte … It was evident that the poor deaf master was no longer able to hear the pianos in his music … ”
Beethoven’s deafness apparently had no effect on audiences or critics, who received the Seventh Symphony with great enthusiasm. At its premiere, one newspaper reported, the “applause rose to the point of ecstasy.” Writing about a subsequent performance, a Leipzig critic noted, “the new symphony (A major) was received with so much applause, again. The reception was as animated as at the first time.”
The 64-measure introduction to the Seventh Symphony was the longest ever written for a symphony at that time. The Poco sostenuto’s carefully constructed foundation of anticipatory energy leads gently into the joyful Vivace, which builds into an ebullient shout.
Audiences at the premiere responded so fervently to the Allegretto that it had to be repeated, and it has enjoyed a fame separate from the Seventh Symphony ever since. As a sure-fire means of stirring audiences, 19th century conductors would often insert the Allegretto into less popular Beethoven symphonies during concerts. The Allegretto has also been featured prominently in film scores, including The King’s Speech (2010); Mr. Holland’s Opus (1995); and X-Men: Apocalypse (2016).
In 1848, Richard Wagner wrote that Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony was “the apotheosis of the dance; it is dance in her highest aspect, as it were the loftiest deed of bodily motion incorporated in an ideal mold of tone.” The whirling energy of the closing Allegro con brio, for example, suggests a ballet dancer performing a series of dazzling fouettes, whipping one leg around and around with seemingly effortless skill. Critics and scholars have likened this movement to a Bacchic revel, and Beethoven himself wrote, “Music is the wine which inspires us to new generative processes, and I am the Bacchus who presses out this glorious wine to make mankind spiritually drunken … ”
© Elizabeth Schwartz