Italian Serenade (Wolf)

Last updated

The Italian Serenade is a piece of music written by Hugo Wolf in 1887. It was originally written for string quartet and named simply "Serenade in G major". By April 1890, he was referring to it in his letters as Italian Serenade. In 1892, he arranged it for string orchestra with an important solo viola part. [1] It is one of his few works other than Lieder.

Contents

History

The work was written between 2 and 4 May 1887. One of its inspirations was his concurrent work on setting various poems by Joseph Eichendorff to music, and the first of them "Der Soldat I" has a theme that is similar to that of the Serenade. That poem's subject is similar to that of Eichendorff's novella Memoirs of a Good-for-Nothing , and it may be that Wolf was as much influenced by this work as he was by the poem. The novella includes a section about an Italian serenade played by a small orchestra. The hero of the novella is a young violinist who leaves home to seek his fortune further afield, and this could well have been something that Wolf could relate to.

It was originally planned as part of a work in three movements. However, Wolf later abandoned this plan in favor of a self-contained, one-movement work. [2] His father died only a week after he wrote the Italian Serenade, and he wrote no more music for the remainder of 1887.

When Wolf orchestrated the work in 1892, he was intending it as the first movement of a four-movement suite. He did sketch a slow movement in G minor, but never finished it. In his letters, he mentions another movement that he claimed to have completed, but that score has never come to light, only 45 measures of sketches being extant. In 1897, he sketched a few pages of a Tarantella to complete the suite, but he was committed to an insane asylum before he could finish it. In summary, all that remains of the projected suite is the Italian Serenade. Throughout his time in the asylum, where he remained for the rest of his life, he planned to complete the suite, but this never eventuated. Wolf died in February 1903.

The quartet version was first performed in May 1890 in Mannheim. [3] The orchestra version was first played in Graz on January 29, 1904, eleven months after Wolf's death, by local orchestra conducted by Richard Wickenhauser. [4]

Structure

The Italian Serenade is quite short, taking only about 7 minutes, and has a lilting and varied theme, played over a pizzicato figure. [5] The main theme is said to have been based on an old Italian melody played on an obsolete form of oboe called the piffero. [2] Its lively and optimistic manner is an evocation of the Italianate spirit, realised through melodic richness. [6] Robert W. Gutman has written that "The essence of the delicious Italian Serenade is its antithesis of romantic sentiment and mocking wit". [7]

Orchesterwerke Romantik Themen.pdf

Orchesterwerke Romantik Themen.pdf

Legacy

The Italian Serenade has been recorded many times; it is a favourite encore piece for string quartets, and it has been arranged by other hands for combinations of instruments such as a wind quintet. [8]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hugo Wolf</span> Austrian composer (1860–1903)

Hugo Philipp Jacob Wolf was an Austrian composer of Slovene origin, particularly noted for his art songs, or Lieder. He brought to this form a concentrated expressive intensity which was unique in late Romantic music, somewhat related to that of the Second Viennese School in concision but diverging greatly in technique.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">String orchestra</span> Musical ensemble

A string orchestra is an orchestra consisting solely of a string section made up of the bowed strings used in Western Classical music. The instruments of such an orchestra are most often the following: the violin, which is divided into first and second violin players, the viola, the cello, and usually, but not always, the double bass.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ernst Toch</span> Austrian composer (1887–1964)

Ernst Toch was an Austrian composer of European classical music and film scores, who from 1933 worked as an émigré in Paris, London and New York. He sought throughout his life to introduce new approaches to music.

<i>Lyric Suite</i> (Berg) String quartet music by Alban Berg

The Lyric Suite is a six-movement work for string quartet written by Alban Berg between 1925 and 1926 using methods derived from Arnold Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique. Though publicly dedicated to Alexander von Zemlinsky, the work has been shown to possess a "secret dedication" and to outline a "secret programme".

Alfred Uhl was an Austrian composer, violist, music teacher and conductor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Serenade</span> Musical composition or performance

In music, a serenade is a musical composition or performance delivered in honor of someone or something. Serenades are typically calm, light pieces of music. The term comes from the Italian word serenata, which itself derives from the Latin serenus. Sense influenced by Italian sera "evening," from Latin sera, fem. of serus "late."

Gordon Percival Septimus Jacob CBE was an English composer and teacher. He was a professor at the Royal College of Music in London from 1924 until his retirement in 1966, and published four books and many articles about music. As a composer he was prolific: the list of his works totals more than 700, mostly compositions of his own, but a substantial minority of orchestrations and arrangements of other composers' works. Those whose music he orchestrated range from William Byrd to Edward Elgar to Noël Coward.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Foulds</span> English composer and cellist

John Herbert Foulds was an English cellist and composer of classical music. He was largely self-taught as a composer, and belongs among the figures of the English Musical Renaissance.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arnold Krug</span> German composer and teacher (1849–1904)

Arnold Krug was a German composer and music teacher.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Claude Delvincourt</span> French composer

Claude Étienne Edmond Marie Pierre Delvincourt was a French pianist and composer of classical music.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hans Gál</span> Austrian composer, musicologist and pianist

Hans Gál OBE was an Austrian composer, pedagogue, musicologist, and author, who emigrated to the United Kingdom in 1938.

Raymond Henry Charles Warren is a British composer and university teacher.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Music of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky</span>

While the contributions of the Russian nationalistic group The Five were important in their own right in developing an independent Russian voice and consciousness in classical music, the compositions of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky became dominant in 19th century Russia, with Tchaikovsky becoming known both in and outside Russia as its greatest musical talent. His formal conservatory training allowed him to write works with Western-oriented attitudes and techniques, showcasing a wide range and breadth of technique from a poised "Classical" form simulating 18th century Rococo elegance to a style more characteristic of Russian nationalists or a musical idiom expressly to channel his own overwrought emotions.

String Quartet No. 2, also known by its other title Company, is a string quartet by American composer Philip Glass. This composition was finished in January 1983 in New York City, and was expected to be a piece of instrumental music for Fred Neumann's adaptation of Samuel Beckett's 1979 novella with the same name.

<i>Die Tageszeiten</i>

Die Tageszeiten is a choral composition written for male voice choir and orchestra by Richard Strauss (1864–1949), TrV 256, Op. 76. It consists of four movements: "The Morning", "Afternoon Peace", "The Evening" and "The Night". The lyrics are based on four poems of the same names by Joseph Eichendorff (1788–1857) from his collection Wanderlieder. The work was premiered on 21 July 1928 with the Wiener Schubertbund and the Vienna Philharmonic as part of the Schubert centenary.

References