Symphonies and Their Meaning Part 14

joyous abandon (in a new mask of the motto), recurring anon as recess from sombre brooding.

Here the second subject has a free song,--in gentle chase of pairs of voices (of woodwind and muted strings and harp) and grows to alluring melody. As

[Music: (Lower reed, with _tremolo_ of lower strings)]

from a dream the eccentric trip awakens us, on ever higher wing. At the top in slower swing of chords horn and reeds chant the antiphonal legend, and in growing rapture, joined by the strings, rush once more into the jubilant revel, the chanting legend still sounding anon in sonorous ba.s.s.

The climax of feeling is uttered in a fiery burst of all the bra.s.s in the former dulcet refrain from the motto. In full sweep of gathering host it flows in unhindered song. Somehow by a slight turn, the tune is transformed into the alluring melody of the second theme. When the former returns, we feel that both strains are singing as part of a single song and that the two subjects are blended and reconciled in rapture of content.

A new mystic play of the quicker motto, answered by the second theme, leads to an overpowering blast of the motto in slowest notes of bra.s.s and reed, ending in a final fanfare.

All lightness is the Scherzo, though we cannot escape a Russian vein of minor even in the dance. A rapid melody has a kind of perpetual motion in the strings, with mimicking echoes in the wood. But the strange part is how the natural accompanying voice below (in the ba.s.soon) makes a haunting melody of

[Music: _Vivo_ (Violins doubled below in violas) (Ba.s.soon) (_Pizz._ cellos)]

its own,--especially when they fly away to the major. As we suspected, the lower proves really the princ.i.p.al song as it winds on in the languorous English horn or in the higher reed. Still the returning dance has now the whole stage in a long romp with strange peasant thud of the bra.s.s on the second beat. Then the song rejoins the dance, just as in answering glee, later in united chorus.

A quieter song (that might have been called the Trio) has still a clinging flavor of the soil,--as of a folk-ballad, that is not lost with the later madrigal nor with the tripping figure that runs along.

Strangely, after the full returning dance, an epilogue

[Music: (Trio) _Poco meno mosso_ (Strings)]

of the ballad appears over a drone, as of bagpipe, through all the harmony of the madrigal. Strangest of all is the playful last refrain in the high piccolo over the constant soft strumming strings.

The Andante, in pure lyric mood, is heavily charged with a certain Oriental languor. The clarinet

[Music: (Clarinet) _Andante_ (Strings with harp)]

leads the song, to rich strum of harp and strings, with its note of sensuous melancholy. Other, more external signs there are of Eastern melody, as in the graceful curl of quicker notes. Intermediate strains between the verses seem gently to rouse the slumbering feeling,--still more when they play between the lines of the song. The pa.s.sion that is lulled in the languor of main melody, is somehow uttered in the later episode,--still more in the dual song of both

[Music: (Violins doubled below) (Horns and ba.s.soons doubled above in wood) (Strings and horns)]

melodies,--though it quickly drops before a strange coquetry of other strains. Yet the climax of the main song is reached when the lighter phrase rings fervently in the high bra.s.s. Here the lyric beauty is stressed in a richer luxuriance of rhythmic setting. Once more sings the pa.s.sionate tune; then in midst of the last verse of the main song is a quick alarm of rushing harp. The languorous dream is broken; there is an air of new expectancy. Instead of a close is a mere pause on a pa.s.sing harmony at the portals of the high festival.

With a clear martial stress the "Russian Theme" is sounded (in low strings), to the full a national

[Music: _Allegro moderato_ Finale _Theme Russe_ (Cellos with ba.s.ses in lower 8ve.)]

tune of northern race. Enriched with prodigal harmony and play of lesser themes it flows merrily on, yet always with a stern pace, breaking out at last in a blare of warlike bra.s.s.

Nor does the martial spirit droop in the second tune, though the melodies are in sheer contrast. In faster rhythm, the second is more festal so that the first returning has a tinge almost of terror. An

[Music: (Cl't) (Strings)]

after-strain of the second has a slightest descent to reflective feeling, from which there is a new rebound

[Music: (Cellos) (Strings and harp with sustained chord of horns)]

to the buoyant (festal) melody.

Here in grim refrains, in dim depths of ba.s.ses (with hollow notes of horns) the national tune has a free fantasy until it is joined by the second in a loud burst in the minor.

Now the latter sings in constant alternation with the answering strain, then descends in turn into the depths of sombre musing. There follows a big, resonant dual climax (the main theme in lower bra.s.s), with an edge of grim defiance. In the lull we seem to catch a brief mystic play of the first motto of the symphony (in the horns) before the last joyous song of both melodies,--all with a power of intricate design and a dazzling brilliancy of harmony, in proud national celebration.

A last romp is in polacca step on the tune of the Russian Theme.

_RIMSKY-KORSAKOW.[A] "ANTAR," SYMPHONY_

[Footnote A: Nicholas Rimsky-Korsakow, Russian, 1844-1908.]

The t.i.tle-page tells us that "the subject is taken from an Arabian tale of Sennkowsky." Opposite the beginning of the score is a summary of the story, in Russian and in French, as follows:

I.--Awful is the view of the desert of Sham; mighty in their desolation are the ruins of Palmyra, the city razed by the spirits of darkness. But Antar, the man of the desert, braves them, and dwells serenely in the midst of the scenes of destruction. Antar has forever forsaken the company of mankind. He has sworn eternal hatred on account of the evil they returned him for the good which he intended.

Suddenly a charming, graceful gazelle appears. Antar starts to pursue it. But a great noise seems pulsing through the heavens, and the light of day is veiled by a dense shadow. It is a giant bird that is giving chase to the gazelle.

Antar straightway changes his intent, and attacks the monster, which gives a piercing cry and flies away. The gazelle disappears at the same time, and Antar, left alone in the midst of ruins, soon goes to sleep while meditating on the event that has happened.

He sees himself transported to a splendid palace, where a mult.i.tude of slaves hasten to serve him and to charm his ear with their song.

It is the abode of the Queen of Palmyra,--the fairy Gul-nazar. The gazelle that he has saved from the talons of the spirit of darkness is none other than the fairy herself. In grat.i.tude Gul-nazar promises Antar the three great joys of life, and, when he a.s.sents to the proffered gift, the vision vanishes and he awakes amid the surrounding ruins.

II.--The first joy granted by the Queen of Palmyra to Antar are the delights of vengeance.

III.--The second joy--the delights of power.

IV.--Antar has returned to the fallen remains of Palmyra. The third and last gift granted by the fairy to Antar is the joy of true love. Antar begs the fairy to take away his life as soon as she perceives the least estrangement on his side, and she promises to do his desire.

After a long time of mutual bliss the fairy perceives, one day, that Antar is absent in spirit and is gazing into the distance.

Straightway, divining the reason, she pa.s.sionately embraces him.

The fire of her love enflames Antar, and his heart is consumed away.

Their lips meet in a last kiss and Antar dies in the arms of the fairy.

The phases of the story are clear in the chain of musical scenes, of the movements themselves and within them. In the opening Largo that recurs in this movement between the visions and happenings, a melody appears (in violas) that moves in all the

[Music: (Violas) _Largo_ (Woodwind)]

acts of the tragedy. It is clearly the Antar motive,--here amidst ruin and desolation.

The fairy theme is also unmistakable, that first plays in the flute, against soft horns, _Allegro giocoso_,

[Music: (Flute) _Allegro giocoso_ (Horns) (Harp)]

and is lost in the onrushing attack, _furioso_, of a strain that begins in murmuring of muted strings.

Other phrases are merely graphic or incidental. But the Antar motive is throughout the central moving figure.