Preview: Heras-Casado and Petrushka

Pablo Heras-Casado

Next up on the Houston Symphony's classical season is Pablo Heras-Casado.

The main event for the orchstra will be Petrushka, by Igor Stravinsky, another of the composer's collaborations with Sergei Diaghilev and the Ballets Russes during the first decades of the 20th Century. Like "The Right of Spring," Pierre Monteaux conducted the premiere.

This is a piece I've never had the chance to play, and alas there is no score available in the public domain to which I could link. But there is a fantastic, full length performance by the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra on Youtube. Even in that format you, can hear the accoustical magnificence of their hall.

(And you can become bitter about the musical sound suck that is Jones Hall. But I digress.).

After the jump, a few words about Petrushka and a chance to hear and see some amazing playing by the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra.

The more I listen to Stravinsky and the deeper I dig, the more I admire his music. This piece, in particular, was a revelation to me as I listened to it twice in succession.

Sure, I knew the trumpet solo excerpt and the flute excerpts, and I had a vague idea about the main thematic materials. But in listening this morning, something about the performance put it into a wider context.

Truly great composers write music that fits in its time period, is connected with the past, and predicts the future all at once. Stravinskiy was truly one of the greats, and he managed to accomplish this.

In this particular piece, I can hear orchestrations and a color pallette that Debussy or Ravel might have used, relatively contemporary to Stravinsky.

But I can also hear the past--Stravinsky's use of tuneful or thematic material in a neoclassical way.
Just imagine what Mozart would have written if he wrote tunes in the key of C Major and F-Sharp Major at the same time.

And looking to the future, you can hear the kinds of blocks of short repetition and color that would later be used by minimalists like John Adams or Philip Glass.

But Stravinsky is truly special. Stravisnsky does all these things in a single piece and uses the music to tell the story of the ballet!

And who else but Stravinsky could successfully score solo passages for E-flat clarinet and Tuba, both playing together in extreme registers.

Give a listen:





There is so much  virtuoso playing required by this piece. I am looking forward to something special from the HSO's key members.