Vast spaces, traversing a broad range of emotional states, their point of origin a singing legato melody played by the horn, and from there on to ever more. From the passionate to the intimate; from the tumultuous and jangling to the celebratory. A wide array of themes and motifs, diverse characters clashing, evolving, vying for their own place in the daylight of sound, yet all conceived of the same matter and ultimately coalescing together to become one. Looking back now I can say that I was aiming for a “grand statement” on a large symphonic scale, using various processes that come into play in various of my works that were written in the decade or so before, in some way reaching a point of culmination in the Symphony.
—Shulamit Ran, September 2023
PROGRAM NOTE
As is the case with many of my works, most of the important ideas of the entire Symphony are clustered together early on in the composition and are organically related. The spacious solo horn melody right at the opening of the first of the Symphony’s three movements can be heard as the source theme, aspects of which are taken up in various guises at other important points. That melody’s leisurely dotted rhythm appears soon thereafter in the slow, ethereal high violin melody, which becomes the second movement’s principal theme. A brief, slow, majestic woodwinds and brass chorale is set to act as a would-be consequent to the high violin melody’s first appearance, returning independently as a stately ostinato in the second half of the first movement, and later again in the latter part of the last movement. The opening solo horn melody also introduces a simple, slow melodic turn that is embedded in a varied form into the stormy appassionato which immediately follows. The modified turn appears in a yet further expanded variation as part of a fanfare-like trumpet solo, itself the seed to further development later on. Finally, the interval of the third with which the opening melody is replete is probably the most characteristic foreground-level building block of the entire symphony.
Connections between movements abound. It is as though ideas appearing early on and having one kind of function are given new identity, taking on a new life as the work progresses. The ethereal violin melody which appears only once in its simple, original form in the first movement—suspending the previous intense motion while, at the same time, providing an antecedent to the woodwind/brass chorale—opens the second movement and is now much elaborated. The new development leads to a modified version of the theme gently played by the viola (like a hushed prayer, as described in the score) and treated in a contrapuntal, imitative manner, eventually reaching its climax in a loosely structured mensuration canon in three voices. The other important element of the second movement is a muted yet distinctive 3-trumpets motif that originated in the first movement, returning unaltered at first, but with further elaborations as the second movement unfolds.
The third movement surprises one, I think, in that its first half appears to have no obvious thematic relationships to the first two movements (except for retaining the pervasive foreground-level interval of the third). For a while, in fact, the last movement does not seem to be concerned with thematic processes as such, but with motion and texture. After a brief opening flourish, the movement proper begins with an obsessive, repeated-note figure appearing first in the bassoons, followed by varying groups of instruments entering and departing in overlapping patterns—like long beams of light forming different color patterns as they scan the landscape. In a formal sense it could perhaps be argued that the last movement acts as two movements in one, with a slow central section (recalling the solos of the second movement) separating the two. Yet there is also a gradual process of transformation here. The obsessive scherzo-like quality of the first part of the movement never actually ceases, but rather evolves into something else. Eventually, the transformation of materials reaches a full circle, as earlier ideas are brought back in the Symphony’s final, climactic moments. Most prominent among these are the percussion cadenza recalling parts of the first movement; the woodwind and brass chorale/ostinato spread now throughout the orchestra; and, finally, the opening melody now heard by all six horns as the dominant component of a much richer texture.
In recent years, I find myself progressively more drawn by the idea, and the ramifications, of a formal return in a piece of music yet, at the same time, moving onward. As in life, one can never go back in time. There is no such thing as a real recapitulation. What has happened in the intervening time has altered things irrevocably. Pitted against this reality is an equally compelling reality, namely, the more things change, the more they remain the same. The cyclical versus the inevitability of the flow of time are two major currents at the source of all of life and nature. Music, I believe, has the unique power to reconcile and be expressive of both.
My first symphony is dedicated to Ralph Shapey, my great colleague, friend, teacher.
—Shulamit Ran
Of note: For the Symphony’s premiere with the Philadelphia Orchestra excellent program notes were written by the Orchestra’s program annotator Bernard Jacobson, with many valuable insights.
The Symphony’s movements should be listed in program books as follows:
I Lento — Molto appassionato / Lento / Majestic / Fanfare-like —Doppio tempo — Lentissimo
II Lento — gently, like a hushed prayer
III Con moto — Maestoso e grande
Whenever possible please add:
Commissioned by the Philadelphia Orchestra and funded by the Rivera-Price Music Foundation and the Rittenhouse Square Committee.
INFORMATION
Commissioned by
the Philadelphia Orchestra,
Riccardo Muti, Music Director
Funded by the Rivera-Price
Music Foundation
and the Rittenhouse
Square Committee
World premiere performances:
October 19, 20, 23, 1990
Academy of Music
Philadelphia, PA
Philadelphia Orchestra
Gary Bertini, conductor
Duration: 34’
SHEET MUSIC
Available from your favorite sheet music seller, or directly from Theodore Presser.