The American West
Symphony No. 3 – Roy Harris
Born February 12, 1898, in Lincoln, Oklahoma
Died October 1, 1979, in Santa Monica, California
This work was premiered on February 24, 1939, at Symphony Hall in Boston by the Boston Symphony conducted by Serge Koussevitzky. It is scored for piccolo, three flutes, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, bass clarinet, two bassoons, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, two tubas, timpani, percussion, and strings.
As the United States grew from infancy and into troubled adolescence in the mid-1800s, it began to produce musicians that were known internationally. Although these performers – perhaps most notably the pianist and composer Louis Moreau Gottschalk – garnered notice, they were trained abroad, usually in Germany or France. Several composers were among these notables, including George Frederick Bristow and William Henry Fry, but their music never attracted a great deal of acceptance. (Thankfully, both composers have received a well-deserved revival in recent years.) By the turn of the century, the U.S. had still not produced the “great American composer” that would establish this country as a creative leader in the musical arts. The twentieth century brought more possibilities. Charles Ives was an iconoclast who dealt with truly American subjects, but his music was performed quite infrequently, usually at concerts that he funded with money earned as an insurance executive. In the United States, most people think of Aaron Copland as the “great American composer,” but his works were slow to gain international popularity. Many scholars point to another composer who enjoyed acclaim around the world, even though his music is rarely performed on American concerts nowadays – Roy Harris. LeRoy Ellsworth Harris was born in Lincoln, Oklahoma, near Chandler, in a log cabin on Lincoln’s birthday in 1898. At the age of four, his parents relocated to the San Gabriel Valley in California to earn a living as farmers, a job that LeRoy (he changed the name in his teens) embraced. During this time, he studied piano with his mother and taught himself to play the clarinet. Harris earned a living doing odd jobs, including a long stint driving a milk truck. After study in Los Angeles and Berkeley, Harris traveled to Paris in 1926 where he entered the class of Nadia Boulanger, the legendary composition instructor who taught generations of students from Copland to Philip Glass. Upon returning to the U.S. after an accident in 1929, Harris underwent spinal surgery and learned to compose away from the piano. During this time, he befriended the composer and founder of the Eastman School of Music, Howard Hanson. It was through Hanson that he met Serge Koussevitzky, the music director of the illustrious Boston Symphony. Harris’s works include film scores, ballets, band works, eighteen symphonies (including several for ensembles other than orchestra) and dozens of other orchestra pieces, several concertos, and numerous choral works. In all, he composed nearly two hundred works. His music was once very popular, but his unchanging style during a time when musical trends frequent fluctuated relegated all but the most brilliant of his works to the library shelf. Simply put, most of Harris’s music was unperformed as he got older. This is one of American music’s most regrettable oversights. Perhaps it was Harris’s working-class background that made his music so identifiably American. His musical approach is a hybrid of folk tunes, hymns, and an ensemble approach that is strongly influenced by Renaissance choral music. Harris’s approach to melody is unique. In a suitable approach for a former farmer, he most often started with a short melodic seed from which the remainder of the movement grows. The fully developed melody is revealed in its complete form near the end. Roy Harris’s Third Symphony was composed in 1937 and premiered in 1939. Many now consider this work to be the “great American symphony,” although its reception at the premiere was far from overwhelming. The composer described the melodic contours as both diatonic (in a set key) and polytonal (in more than one key). Similarly, he characterized the harmonic textures as displaying consonance, but also as polytonal. Harris cast the work in one long movement, but it is split into five sections. The now-centenarian composer Elliott Carter described the work in a 1940 review as being “in five block-like sections, each one with a dominating idea so definite that its character can be grasped at once….Each of the five sections is built on clearly stated themes, often of considerable length. The articulation of phrase and of section is always clearly marked.” Harris provided a basic outline of each section and its characteristics, giving the listener a perfect description to aid in listening to the performance:
Section I: Tragic – low string sonorities.
Section II: Lyric – strings, horns, and woodwinds.
Section III: Pastoral – emphasizing woodwind color.
Section IV: Fugue – dramatic. A. Brass – percussion predominating. B. Canonic development of Section II material constituting background for further development of Fugue. C. Brass Climax. Rhythmic motif derived from Fugue subject.
Section V: Dramatic – Tragic. A. Restatement of Violin Theme Section I. Tutti strings in canon with tutti woodwinds. Brass and percussion develop rhythmic motif from climax of Section IV. B. Coda—development of materials from Section I and II over timpani pedal
Suite from the Ballet Billy the Kid – Aaron Copland
Born November 14, 1900, in Brooklyn, New York
Died December 2, 1990, in North Tarrytown, New York
The ballet from which the composer extracted this suite received its premiere in a version for two pianos in Chicago on October 16, 1938. A version for orchestra premiered in New York on May 24, 1939. The Suite was first heard on November 9, 1940. It is scored for two piccolos, two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, harp, piano, and strings.
Described by Leonard Bernstein as the “Dean of American Music,” Aaron Copland delighted in his role as its elder statesman in the later years of his life. Perhaps this is due to the seventy years he was involved in various musical endeavors. Before launching his compositional career with the resounding bang of his Organ Symphony in a 1925 New York concert, he had studied at the American Conservatory at Fontainebleau in Paris since 1921. Among the distinguished faculty, noted pedagogue Nadia Boulanger’s reputation stood above all others, teaching generations of American composers from Copland to Philip Glass. Barely in his twenties, Copland was a renegade among composers, using harmonies that were often dissonant and abrasive.
In the late 1930s, Copland began to face the reality of shrinking audiences at orchestral concerts. He knew there must be a way to draw people back into the concert hall and to energize orchestral music. Copland’s new “populist” style, which often quoted folk music, used an approachable musical language in an effort to remedy the problem. He often incorporated jazz-inspired rhythms and elements of popular music to express his ideas and draw listeners closer to his music.
In 1938 the noted ballet impresario Lincoln Kirstein commissioned Copland to write a new work for his Ballet Caravan, a company that toured the country and took ballet to many places that would not otherwise have experienced the art of dance. Kirstein envisioned a work based on the American West to be choreographed by Eugene Loring. The subject would be Billy the Kid.
The notorious cowboy-killer, Billy the Kid, was William Bonney, who was born in New York City at the close of the Civil War and, in childhood, moved west with his parents. He killed his first man at the age of twelve, supposedly to avenge the killing of his mother. Before he reached the age of twenty-one he had shot a man for each year of his life. A handsome and at time courteous man, a fine dancer, and a great favorite of Mexican girls and ranchers’ daughters, Billy could never submit to the rule of law. When his friend, Pat Garrett, became a sheriff, Billy knew that one of them must die. After a number of captures and escapes, he was ambushed by Garrett while asleep in the home of his Mexican sweetheart.
Copland’s ballet suite for orchestra, extracted in 1940, is in seven episodes. “The Open prairie,” is an orchestral portrait of the vast and empty plains, with a sauntering pace and prominent woodwind parts. The orchestra crescendos and eventually reaches a stirring climax.
The second episode, “Street in a Frontier Town,” recreates the spirit of the pioneer West. Cowboys mosey into town. Mexican women dance a Jarabe, interrupted by a fight between drunk men. The music is colorful, lively, and at times agitated.
“Prairie Night” (Card Game), is a quiet interlude sandwiched between two boisterous movements. An atmospheric melody for woodwinds and muted strings depicts Billy and his outlaw friends quietly playing cards under the stars.
In the fourth movement, “Gun Battle,” crashing drums and dramatic music for winds accompany the capture of Billy.
“Celebration” (After Billy’s Capture), uses phrases from authentic cowboy songs. The music begins quietly, but happily. Eventually a drunken brawl erupts.
The sixth movement is entitled “Billy’s Death.” In a short but sorrowful episode, Mexican women lament the passing of their hero, an enemy of law and order in the Wild West but always a friend to them. (In the ballet, Billy, worn out in the desert after his final escape, relaxes with his sweetheart in a Pas de deux. This historically inaccurate action concludes with his capture and execution.)
Copland’s suite ends with an epilogue, “The Open Prairie Again,” and a return to the initial theme in the horns. The work culminates in a stirring climax for full orchestra.
Copland quotes from familiar cowboy songs with great ingenuity but never literally. Expect to hear “Git Along Little Dogies,” “Old Chisholm Trail,” “Goodbye, Old Paint,” and others. However, he does not refer to “Home on the Range,” because, as Copland explained with his usual succinctness, “I had to draw the line somewhere.”
Grand Canyon Suite – Ferdinand “Ferde” Grofé
Born March 27, 1892, in New York
Died April 3, 1972, in Santa Monica, California
This work was premiered on November 22, 1931, at the Studebaker Theater in Chicago by the Paul Whiteman Orchestra. It is scored for piccolo, two flutes, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, bass clarinets, two bassoons, contrabassoon, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, harp, and strings.
Composer and arranger Ferde Grofé is probably most famous for his orchestrations of the symphonic music of George Gershwin – especially his Rhapsody in Blue in 1924. However, most people do not realize that Grofé’s talent was in great demand in jazz, classical, and popular music circles from the early 1920s until his death in 1972. His musical tastes were the product of an intensely musical upbringing. His father was a violinist in the Boston Symphony Orchestra and his mother was a gifted cellist who studied at the Leipzig Conservatory. When Ferde was just eight years old his father died and the family moved to Germany. Ferde was exposed to a vast new world of musical creativity. In Leipzig, he studied viola, piano and composition. When mother and son returned to New York three years later, he had decided on a musical career.
From 1920 until 1932 he was the pianist and arranger for the Paul Whiteman Orchestra, the most successful band in America. In his teens, Grofé had composed The Elks Reunion March for orchestra, but had no reason to return to composition for that ensemble until he was firmly ensconced in the Whiteman fold. With his unforeseen success in the early Twenties, there was no reason to wait longer. Grofé’s first composition for Whiteman was the descriptive Broadway at Night in 1924. His considerable talent for creating musically descriptive scenes was immediately recognized.
The most popular body of work that Grofé’s wrote for Whiteman was a series of suites. The first of these, entitled Mississippi Suite, dates from 1925 and examines sights along the Mississippi River much in the same way that Smetana’s tone-poem The Moldau treats similar scenes. In 1928 he composed the Metropolis Suite, a vivid portrayal of New York in the Jazz Age. Whiteman’s audience at the premiere in Carnegie Hall was somewhat baffled by the work, as its strong jazz influence was contrary to the sedate non-improvisatory ‘society orchestra’ sound that set Whiteman’s group apart from the ‘hot’ jazz groups of the day.
Grofé’s next work catapulted him into stardom. The Grand Canyon Suite was the result of a request by Whiteman on the eve of his wedding in 1931. To honor the bandleader’s nuptials, Grofé decided to assemble a series of vignettes based on an earlier vacation he had taken to the Grand Canyon. The composer set to work at a seaside resort, but distractions were too numerous for the work to take shape. Whiteman offered his own cottage on a Wisconsin lake and it was there, far away from the Arizona desert, that the bulk of the work was completed. The premiere in November at Chicago’s Studebaker Theater proved to be the most resounding success of the composer’s career.
Grofé provided detailed descriptions of the five movements of Grand Canyon Suite. They provide the best insight yet offered into this pictorial work and are printed below in their entirety:
“Sunrise: It is early morning on the desert. The sun rises slowly spattering the darkness with rich colors of dawn. The sun comes from beyond the horizon and a brilliant spray of colors announces the full break of day.
“The movement begins with a soft roll on the kettledrums, and a series of chords played by the woodwind follows. The main theme is played by the English horn. The development of the movement is taken up by other instruments reaching a triumphant climax that depicts the dawn of a new day.
“The Painted Desert: The desert is silent and mysterious, yet beautiful. As the bright rays of the sun are reflected against majestic crags and spread across the sands in varying hues, the entire scene appears as a canvas thick with the pigments of nature's own blending.
“The movement starts with a mysterious theme played by bass clarinet and viola accompanied by weird chords in the lower registers of the orchestra. It is interrupted by strange harmonies from the woodwind and the upper register of the piano. A contrasting melody of lyric quality follows. This is succeeded by the mysterious music which opened the movement.
“On the Trail: A traveler and his burro are descending the trail. The sharp hoof beats of the animal form an unusual rhythmic background for the cowboy's song. The sounds of a waterfall tell them of a nearby oasis. A lone cabin is soon sighted and, as they near it, a music box is heard. The travelers stop at the cabin for refreshment. Now fully rested, the travelers journey forth at a livelier pace. The movement ends as man and burro disappear in the distance.
“This is the most popular movement of the suite. It starts as the orchestra simulates the loud bray of a burro. After a violin cadenza, the first theme - a graceful melody in a rhythmic pattern - is established. It has the feeling of the burro walking. The second theme of the movement - a melody in Western style - is played contrapuntally to the first. This is followed by a suggestion of an old music box, which is played by the celeste. The opening theme is heard again in a faster tempo. The movement is concluded with the bray of the burro and the musical ending, itself, is short and incisive.
“Sunset: Now the shades of night sweep over the golden hues of day. As evening envelopes the desert in a cloak of darkness, there is a suggestion of animal calls coming from the distant rim of the canyon.
“A wild, animal-like call, played by the horns, opens this movement. This is followed by the main theme, which is introduced by bells and violins. In the development, the theme is repeated by oboes and violins, then by woodwind and violins, again by cellos and horns, horns and flutes. Finally, the horns again play the calls heard in the opening bars and the movement ends as the tones fade into the distance.
“Cloudburst: This is the most pictorial movement of the suite. We hear the approach of the storm. Lightning flashes across the sky and thunder roars from the darkness. The torrent of rain reaches its height in a cloudburst, but the storm disappears rapidly and the moon comes from behind clouds. Nature again rejoices in all its grandeur.
“Glissando effects in the violin section describe the approach of the storm. It is interesting to note how in the development of the movement Grofe uses all the resources of the orchestra to portray the battle of the elements. The agitated movement subsides, and then follows a gradual crescendo that reaches its climax at the very end.”
©2011 Orpheus Music Prose & Craig Doolin
www.orpheusnotes.com
Born February 12, 1898, in Lincoln, Oklahoma
Died October 1, 1979, in Santa Monica, California
This work was premiered on February 24, 1939, at Symphony Hall in Boston by the Boston Symphony conducted by Serge Koussevitzky. It is scored for piccolo, three flutes, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, bass clarinet, two bassoons, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, two tubas, timpani, percussion, and strings.
As the United States grew from infancy and into troubled adolescence in the mid-1800s, it began to produce musicians that were known internationally. Although these performers – perhaps most notably the pianist and composer Louis Moreau Gottschalk – garnered notice, they were trained abroad, usually in Germany or France. Several composers were among these notables, including George Frederick Bristow and William Henry Fry, but their music never attracted a great deal of acceptance. (Thankfully, both composers have received a well-deserved revival in recent years.) By the turn of the century, the U.S. had still not produced the “great American composer” that would establish this country as a creative leader in the musical arts. The twentieth century brought more possibilities. Charles Ives was an iconoclast who dealt with truly American subjects, but his music was performed quite infrequently, usually at concerts that he funded with money earned as an insurance executive. In the United States, most people think of Aaron Copland as the “great American composer,” but his works were slow to gain international popularity. Many scholars point to another composer who enjoyed acclaim around the world, even though his music is rarely performed on American concerts nowadays – Roy Harris. LeRoy Ellsworth Harris was born in Lincoln, Oklahoma, near Chandler, in a log cabin on Lincoln’s birthday in 1898. At the age of four, his parents relocated to the San Gabriel Valley in California to earn a living as farmers, a job that LeRoy (he changed the name in his teens) embraced. During this time, he studied piano with his mother and taught himself to play the clarinet. Harris earned a living doing odd jobs, including a long stint driving a milk truck. After study in Los Angeles and Berkeley, Harris traveled to Paris in 1926 where he entered the class of Nadia Boulanger, the legendary composition instructor who taught generations of students from Copland to Philip Glass. Upon returning to the U.S. after an accident in 1929, Harris underwent spinal surgery and learned to compose away from the piano. During this time, he befriended the composer and founder of the Eastman School of Music, Howard Hanson. It was through Hanson that he met Serge Koussevitzky, the music director of the illustrious Boston Symphony. Harris’s works include film scores, ballets, band works, eighteen symphonies (including several for ensembles other than orchestra) and dozens of other orchestra pieces, several concertos, and numerous choral works. In all, he composed nearly two hundred works. His music was once very popular, but his unchanging style during a time when musical trends frequent fluctuated relegated all but the most brilliant of his works to the library shelf. Simply put, most of Harris’s music was unperformed as he got older. This is one of American music’s most regrettable oversights. Perhaps it was Harris’s working-class background that made his music so identifiably American. His musical approach is a hybrid of folk tunes, hymns, and an ensemble approach that is strongly influenced by Renaissance choral music. Harris’s approach to melody is unique. In a suitable approach for a former farmer, he most often started with a short melodic seed from which the remainder of the movement grows. The fully developed melody is revealed in its complete form near the end. Roy Harris’s Third Symphony was composed in 1937 and premiered in 1939. Many now consider this work to be the “great American symphony,” although its reception at the premiere was far from overwhelming. The composer described the melodic contours as both diatonic (in a set key) and polytonal (in more than one key). Similarly, he characterized the harmonic textures as displaying consonance, but also as polytonal. Harris cast the work in one long movement, but it is split into five sections. The now-centenarian composer Elliott Carter described the work in a 1940 review as being “in five block-like sections, each one with a dominating idea so definite that its character can be grasped at once….Each of the five sections is built on clearly stated themes, often of considerable length. The articulation of phrase and of section is always clearly marked.” Harris provided a basic outline of each section and its characteristics, giving the listener a perfect description to aid in listening to the performance:
Section I: Tragic – low string sonorities.
Section II: Lyric – strings, horns, and woodwinds.
Section III: Pastoral – emphasizing woodwind color.
Section IV: Fugue – dramatic. A. Brass – percussion predominating. B. Canonic development of Section II material constituting background for further development of Fugue. C. Brass Climax. Rhythmic motif derived from Fugue subject.
Section V: Dramatic – Tragic. A. Restatement of Violin Theme Section I. Tutti strings in canon with tutti woodwinds. Brass and percussion develop rhythmic motif from climax of Section IV. B. Coda—development of materials from Section I and II over timpani pedal
Suite from the Ballet Billy the Kid – Aaron Copland
Born November 14, 1900, in Brooklyn, New York
Died December 2, 1990, in North Tarrytown, New York
The ballet from which the composer extracted this suite received its premiere in a version for two pianos in Chicago on October 16, 1938. A version for orchestra premiered in New York on May 24, 1939. The Suite was first heard on November 9, 1940. It is scored for two piccolos, two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, harp, piano, and strings.
Described by Leonard Bernstein as the “Dean of American Music,” Aaron Copland delighted in his role as its elder statesman in the later years of his life. Perhaps this is due to the seventy years he was involved in various musical endeavors. Before launching his compositional career with the resounding bang of his Organ Symphony in a 1925 New York concert, he had studied at the American Conservatory at Fontainebleau in Paris since 1921. Among the distinguished faculty, noted pedagogue Nadia Boulanger’s reputation stood above all others, teaching generations of American composers from Copland to Philip Glass. Barely in his twenties, Copland was a renegade among composers, using harmonies that were often dissonant and abrasive.
In the late 1930s, Copland began to face the reality of shrinking audiences at orchestral concerts. He knew there must be a way to draw people back into the concert hall and to energize orchestral music. Copland’s new “populist” style, which often quoted folk music, used an approachable musical language in an effort to remedy the problem. He often incorporated jazz-inspired rhythms and elements of popular music to express his ideas and draw listeners closer to his music.
In 1938 the noted ballet impresario Lincoln Kirstein commissioned Copland to write a new work for his Ballet Caravan, a company that toured the country and took ballet to many places that would not otherwise have experienced the art of dance. Kirstein envisioned a work based on the American West to be choreographed by Eugene Loring. The subject would be Billy the Kid.
The notorious cowboy-killer, Billy the Kid, was William Bonney, who was born in New York City at the close of the Civil War and, in childhood, moved west with his parents. He killed his first man at the age of twelve, supposedly to avenge the killing of his mother. Before he reached the age of twenty-one he had shot a man for each year of his life. A handsome and at time courteous man, a fine dancer, and a great favorite of Mexican girls and ranchers’ daughters, Billy could never submit to the rule of law. When his friend, Pat Garrett, became a sheriff, Billy knew that one of them must die. After a number of captures and escapes, he was ambushed by Garrett while asleep in the home of his Mexican sweetheart.
Copland’s ballet suite for orchestra, extracted in 1940, is in seven episodes. “The Open prairie,” is an orchestral portrait of the vast and empty plains, with a sauntering pace and prominent woodwind parts. The orchestra crescendos and eventually reaches a stirring climax.
The second episode, “Street in a Frontier Town,” recreates the spirit of the pioneer West. Cowboys mosey into town. Mexican women dance a Jarabe, interrupted by a fight between drunk men. The music is colorful, lively, and at times agitated.
“Prairie Night” (Card Game), is a quiet interlude sandwiched between two boisterous movements. An atmospheric melody for woodwinds and muted strings depicts Billy and his outlaw friends quietly playing cards under the stars.
In the fourth movement, “Gun Battle,” crashing drums and dramatic music for winds accompany the capture of Billy.
“Celebration” (After Billy’s Capture), uses phrases from authentic cowboy songs. The music begins quietly, but happily. Eventually a drunken brawl erupts.
The sixth movement is entitled “Billy’s Death.” In a short but sorrowful episode, Mexican women lament the passing of their hero, an enemy of law and order in the Wild West but always a friend to them. (In the ballet, Billy, worn out in the desert after his final escape, relaxes with his sweetheart in a Pas de deux. This historically inaccurate action concludes with his capture and execution.)
Copland’s suite ends with an epilogue, “The Open Prairie Again,” and a return to the initial theme in the horns. The work culminates in a stirring climax for full orchestra.
Copland quotes from familiar cowboy songs with great ingenuity but never literally. Expect to hear “Git Along Little Dogies,” “Old Chisholm Trail,” “Goodbye, Old Paint,” and others. However, he does not refer to “Home on the Range,” because, as Copland explained with his usual succinctness, “I had to draw the line somewhere.”
Grand Canyon Suite – Ferdinand “Ferde” Grofé
Born March 27, 1892, in New York
Died April 3, 1972, in Santa Monica, California
This work was premiered on November 22, 1931, at the Studebaker Theater in Chicago by the Paul Whiteman Orchestra. It is scored for piccolo, two flutes, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, bass clarinets, two bassoons, contrabassoon, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, harp, and strings.
Composer and arranger Ferde Grofé is probably most famous for his orchestrations of the symphonic music of George Gershwin – especially his Rhapsody in Blue in 1924. However, most people do not realize that Grofé’s talent was in great demand in jazz, classical, and popular music circles from the early 1920s until his death in 1972. His musical tastes were the product of an intensely musical upbringing. His father was a violinist in the Boston Symphony Orchestra and his mother was a gifted cellist who studied at the Leipzig Conservatory. When Ferde was just eight years old his father died and the family moved to Germany. Ferde was exposed to a vast new world of musical creativity. In Leipzig, he studied viola, piano and composition. When mother and son returned to New York three years later, he had decided on a musical career.
From 1920 until 1932 he was the pianist and arranger for the Paul Whiteman Orchestra, the most successful band in America. In his teens, Grofé had composed The Elks Reunion March for orchestra, but had no reason to return to composition for that ensemble until he was firmly ensconced in the Whiteman fold. With his unforeseen success in the early Twenties, there was no reason to wait longer. Grofé’s first composition for Whiteman was the descriptive Broadway at Night in 1924. His considerable talent for creating musically descriptive scenes was immediately recognized.
The most popular body of work that Grofé’s wrote for Whiteman was a series of suites. The first of these, entitled Mississippi Suite, dates from 1925 and examines sights along the Mississippi River much in the same way that Smetana’s tone-poem The Moldau treats similar scenes. In 1928 he composed the Metropolis Suite, a vivid portrayal of New York in the Jazz Age. Whiteman’s audience at the premiere in Carnegie Hall was somewhat baffled by the work, as its strong jazz influence was contrary to the sedate non-improvisatory ‘society orchestra’ sound that set Whiteman’s group apart from the ‘hot’ jazz groups of the day.
Grofé’s next work catapulted him into stardom. The Grand Canyon Suite was the result of a request by Whiteman on the eve of his wedding in 1931. To honor the bandleader’s nuptials, Grofé decided to assemble a series of vignettes based on an earlier vacation he had taken to the Grand Canyon. The composer set to work at a seaside resort, but distractions were too numerous for the work to take shape. Whiteman offered his own cottage on a Wisconsin lake and it was there, far away from the Arizona desert, that the bulk of the work was completed. The premiere in November at Chicago’s Studebaker Theater proved to be the most resounding success of the composer’s career.
Grofé provided detailed descriptions of the five movements of Grand Canyon Suite. They provide the best insight yet offered into this pictorial work and are printed below in their entirety:
“Sunrise: It is early morning on the desert. The sun rises slowly spattering the darkness with rich colors of dawn. The sun comes from beyond the horizon and a brilliant spray of colors announces the full break of day.
“The movement begins with a soft roll on the kettledrums, and a series of chords played by the woodwind follows. The main theme is played by the English horn. The development of the movement is taken up by other instruments reaching a triumphant climax that depicts the dawn of a new day.
“The Painted Desert: The desert is silent and mysterious, yet beautiful. As the bright rays of the sun are reflected against majestic crags and spread across the sands in varying hues, the entire scene appears as a canvas thick with the pigments of nature's own blending.
“The movement starts with a mysterious theme played by bass clarinet and viola accompanied by weird chords in the lower registers of the orchestra. It is interrupted by strange harmonies from the woodwind and the upper register of the piano. A contrasting melody of lyric quality follows. This is succeeded by the mysterious music which opened the movement.
“On the Trail: A traveler and his burro are descending the trail. The sharp hoof beats of the animal form an unusual rhythmic background for the cowboy's song. The sounds of a waterfall tell them of a nearby oasis. A lone cabin is soon sighted and, as they near it, a music box is heard. The travelers stop at the cabin for refreshment. Now fully rested, the travelers journey forth at a livelier pace. The movement ends as man and burro disappear in the distance.
“This is the most popular movement of the suite. It starts as the orchestra simulates the loud bray of a burro. After a violin cadenza, the first theme - a graceful melody in a rhythmic pattern - is established. It has the feeling of the burro walking. The second theme of the movement - a melody in Western style - is played contrapuntally to the first. This is followed by a suggestion of an old music box, which is played by the celeste. The opening theme is heard again in a faster tempo. The movement is concluded with the bray of the burro and the musical ending, itself, is short and incisive.
“Sunset: Now the shades of night sweep over the golden hues of day. As evening envelopes the desert in a cloak of darkness, there is a suggestion of animal calls coming from the distant rim of the canyon.
“A wild, animal-like call, played by the horns, opens this movement. This is followed by the main theme, which is introduced by bells and violins. In the development, the theme is repeated by oboes and violins, then by woodwind and violins, again by cellos and horns, horns and flutes. Finally, the horns again play the calls heard in the opening bars and the movement ends as the tones fade into the distance.
“Cloudburst: This is the most pictorial movement of the suite. We hear the approach of the storm. Lightning flashes across the sky and thunder roars from the darkness. The torrent of rain reaches its height in a cloudburst, but the storm disappears rapidly and the moon comes from behind clouds. Nature again rejoices in all its grandeur.
“Glissando effects in the violin section describe the approach of the storm. It is interesting to note how in the development of the movement Grofe uses all the resources of the orchestra to portray the battle of the elements. The agitated movement subsides, and then follows a gradual crescendo that reaches its climax at the very end.”
©2011 Orpheus Music Prose & Craig Doolin
www.orpheusnotes.com