Nouneh Sarkissian in partnership with Steinway & Sons

presents a piano recital

7:30 p.m. Friday 23rd October 2015
St. Yeghiches Armenian Church
Cranley Gardens, London, SW7 3BB

Poetry in Music
by Kit Armstrong

Songs of the ars nova:

la harpe de mlodie Jacques de Senleches c.1400
de toutes flours Guillaume de Machaut c.1300-1377
en un vergier anonymous c.1410
puis quen oubli Guillaume de Machaut

William Byrd (c.1540-1623): Walsingham

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750): Chorale preludes

Der Tag, der ist so freudenreich BWV 605
Vom Himmel hoch, da komm ich her BWV 738
Erbarm dich mein, o Herre Gott BWV 721
Jesus Christus, unser Heiland BWV 666
Alle Menschen mssen sterben BWV 643

Frederic Chopin (1810-1847): Ballade #3, Op. 47

Franz Liszt (1811-1886): Two Episodes from Lenaus Faust

The Night Procession & The Village Inn Dance

This is a one-hour concert with no interval.

The proceeds of this charitable concert will go to restoring the former church
Sainte-Thrse in Hirson, France as a cultural centre.

Please make cheques payable to Kit Armstrong.

The glise Sainte-Thrse-de-lEnfant-
Jsus in Hirson, France dates from
1929. It is built of reinforced
concrete in an Art Deco style. The
two aisles and central nave, 20m in
height, of its basilical structure make
for a total surface of about 600 m2.

Notable elements include a facade

sculpted by Jacques Martin, and a
ceiling decorated with 1,500 roses
symbolising the roses scattered by
Sainte Thrse.

The city of Hirson, Picardy is

situated near the Belgian border,
adjoining a national forest. Once
Frances second most important city
for industrial rail transport, it now
has about 10,000 inhabitants.

When the diocese no longer had the

means to maintain the church, it
began to fall into disrepair, leading
to the demolition of the campanile
in 2008. While visiting the church, I
was struck by its beauty and its
unusual history and conceived the
project of saving and reawakening it
by giving it a second life through
music.

In February 2013, I became the

owner of the church. My project is
to establish an international creative
centre for music, culture, and art, far
from the agitation of large cities and
tourist centres, with the goal of:
 contributing to the rediscovery
of a repertoire neglected today,
particularly of old composers
such as Guillaume de Machaut,
in the region that was home to
many important movements in
Western music;

bringing together researchers,

interpreters, scholars, and
enlightened amateurs in musical
conferences;

organising creative encounters

between musicians, painters,
sculptors, and other artists, for
which I have already
transformed the former sacristy
into an artist residence.

The project involves a number of

urgent tasks, including:

renovation of the central

performance space;

bringing the building up to

modern safety standards for a
concert hall;

restoring the stained glass,

including the spectacular rose
window.

Kit Armstrong

See www.kitarmstrong.com for

more information.
 Poetry in Music a piano recital

It is with the French composer-poets of the 14th century, successors of the

troubadours, inventors of written art-music, that tonights exploration of
Poetry in Music begins. Far from being primitive, the ars nova and the ars
subtilior (also known as late ars nova) achieved a refinement and a
complexity that would remain unequalled in the history of music. A
typical work had two intertwined elements: a poem in one of the
standard forms of virelai, rondeau, or ballade; and a musical text of three
voices, of which one (the cantus) was set to the poem. Through the
creativity of the composer-poets, text and music formed a symbiotic
relationship. This manifests itself most obviously in instances of musical
word- and mood-painting, and in cadences or melodic motifs that
reinforce the verse structure.

Example: Douce dame jolie. The refrain of Guillaume de Machauts most famous
virelai has its -i-e rhyme supported by a repeating melodic figure (coloured).
La harpe de mlodie (Virelai) Jacob (or Jacques) de Senleches (c.1400)

La harpe de melodie
faite sans milancholie
par plaisir
doit bien chascun resjor
pour larmonie
or sonner et ver

The harp of melody,

made without melancholy,
for pleasure,
should bring joy to everyone
to hear, sound and see
harmony.

(Translations mine unless

otherwise stated.)

(Image: Newberry Library,

Chicago)

This pieces presentation makes it clear that music, text, and picture were
not to be considered separately, but rather were elements of a single
artwork. It is, moreover, an artwork dedicated to music, as its poem
specifies, and its other aspects substantiate:

visually its notation in the form of a harp, the archetype of

musical instruments; and

musically its composition as a canon, a symbol of musical

craftsmanship.
Musical craftsmanship is taken one step further in the use of complex
rhythms, indicated through note colours, shapes, and a variety of stem
types (see facsimile). In ars subtilior, one frequently encounters elaborate
use of this system, which developed from the ars nova notational
inventions that precisely described time in music for the first time.

Illustration: the durations of notes in mensural notation.

The ars subtilior mensural notation is suited to express proportions and

syncopations concisely in a way that the modern notation is not. This
comes at the cost of robustness; one small copying error can lead to a
long succession of corruptions. We are therefore fortunate to have so
many authentic manuscripts that survive in good condition.

Example: An excerpt from La harpe de mlodie in modern notation.

De toutes flours (Ballade) Guillaume de Machaut (c.1300 - 1377)

De toutes flours navoit et de tous fruis
en mon vergier fors une seule rose
gastes estoit li seurplus et destruis
par Fortune qui durement soppose
contre ceste douce flour
pour amatir sa coulour et sodour.
Mais se cueillir la voy ou trebuchier,
autre aprs li jamais avoir ne quier.
Of all the flowers and of all fruits,
only a single rose was left in my orchard;
the rest were spoiled and destroyed
by Fortune, who harshly battled
against that sweet flower,
to make pallid its colour and its odour.
But if I see it plucked or bowed,
never after shall I seek to have another.

Mais vraiement imaginer ne puis Yet I really cannot imagine

que la vertus, ou ma rose est enclose,
viengne par toy et par tes faus conduis,
ains est drois dons natureus; si suppose
que tu navras ja vigour
d'anientir son pris et sa valour.
Lay la moy donc, quailleurs nen mon vergier
autre aprs li jamais avoir ne quier.
that from you and your false acts could come
the virtue which surrounds my rose,
for it is a pure gift of nature; and so I suppose
that you will never have the strength
to eliminate its worth and value.
So leave it to me, for outside my orchard
never after shall I seek to have another.

He! Fortune, qui es gouffres et puis
pour engloutir tout homme qui croire ose,
ta fausse loy, ou riens de biens ne truis
ne de ser, trop est decevans chose;
ton ris, ta joie, tonnour
ne sont que plour, tristesse, et deshonnour.
Se ty faus tour font ma rose sechier,
autre aprs li jamais avoir ne quier.
Ah! Fortune, you who are a wasteful pit
engulfing everyone who dares to believe
your false law (wherein I find nothing good
or sure, such a deceitful thing it is):
your laughter, your joy, your honour
are nothing but tears, sadness, and dishonour.
If your false turns cause my rose to wither,
never after shall I seek to have another.
(Translation: Leonard Johnson)

If we have any clear idea of the ars nova, it is due to the lifes work of
Guillaume de Machaut, which established the essential character of all
the standard forms. Its consistent quality, variety, and well defined
personality were made all the more easy to recognise by the numerous
contemporaneous complete editions still extant of Machauts musico-
poetic compositions.
Facsimile: the index of a collection of Machauts works, evidently authoritative:
Here the arrangement that G. de Machau wants in his book (top left, in red).

Some works of Machaut, including De toutes flours, also remained in the

active copying tradition and were in musicians repertory long after the
his death. Remarkably, Machaut is the sole representative of his era in
most later manuscripts of the 14th and 15th centuries, which contain
music of a style that, even to us 600 years later, feels very different.

Illustration: a copy of De toutes flours, over half a century later. The Modena
manuscript documents the far-reaching fame that was accorded to Machauts
works, more than to those of any contemporary. (Image: Biblioteca Estense)
Revival of interest in Machauts works in the 19th century began with
appreciative consideration of his poetry. The foreword to the publication
in 1875 of Machauts Livre du Voir-Dit (A true story, 1362-1365),
however, reveals the attitude, and even ignorance, which prevented
serious consideration of his music:

Nous ne comprenons plus rien la musique vocale et

instrumentale des anciens; dans les temps plus rapprochs de
nous, les Ockeghen [sic] & les Marcello [?!] ont cd le pas
Lulli; Lulli s'est son tour effac devant Rameau, et qui apprcie
aujourdhui l'uvre de Rameau?

We do not understand at all the vocal and instrumental music of

the ancients any more; in times closer to ours, the likes of
(Johannes) Ockeghem (c.1420-1497) and Marcello (surely not the
brothers Alessandro and Benedetto of the 17th century?) ceded
their place to (Jean-Baptiste) Lully (1632-1687); Lully in turn was
superseded by (Jean-Philippe) Rameau (1683-1764), and who
nowadays appreciates the work of Rameau? [emphasis added]

Soon, though, De toutes flours came to be among a few pieces that stood
out. Even long before we started to understand ancient music on its own
terms (as we like to believe today), the German musicologist Hugo
Riemann in 1906 described it as wirklich schn (truly beautiful) and
recognised in it romantische Schwrmerei (romantic rapture).
En un vergier (Ballade) anonymous

En un vergier clos par mensure

say une flour de lis moult gente
Li vergier est fort de closure
et la flour nasqui de bone gente
Au plus noble estoit en parente
et riche d'avoir et d'amys.
Dites moi, selon vostre entente,
Qui cuellera la flour de lis?

In an orchard closed all around

sits a very tender lily flower.
The orchard is secure in its
enclosure, and the flower was
born of good stock. It was most
noble of parentage, rich in
possessions and in friends. Tell
me, according to your intent,
who will pluck the lily flower?

(Image: Biblioteca estense)

In the decades around 1400, musical tastes changed more quickly and
drastically than at perhaps any other time in history. An authoritative
treatise of the 15th century by Tinctoris considered no music older than
40 years to be of value, and confirmed the eras ignorance of the art and
aesthetic of the ars nova and ars subtilior, describing such works as

adeo inepte adeo insulse composita ut multo potius aures

offendebant quam delectabant

so awkwardly, so insipidly composed that they were much more

likely to offend than to delight the ears.
It is a frequent criticism also of later musicologists that the dissonance
and complexity which the ars subtilior pushed to their limits resulted in
purely artificial music. Certainly the bewildering melodic and rhythmic
possibilities produced an effect of arbitrariness in unskilled hands. En un
vergier, however, is an impressive counterexample to the oft-hinted-at
verdict that the end did not justify the means.

Finding subtleties in En un vergier is no great challenge. The offsets in

time between the voices hardly allow any harmony to present itself
clearly to the listener. In particular, the melody (the cantus) is extensively
prevented from aligning with the rhythm or harmony of the other voices
by syncopation. Coordination is further stretched by the independent
activity of three rhythmic layers, at times in difficult ratios of 8:3:2 or
4:6:9. But it is precisely these complications that make its memorable
impression possible: a sensuality that simplicity could not achieve, that
makes itself felt in the levitation of a long melody over hazy harmonies.
En un vergiers notable re-discoverer Nors Josephson attributed it to a
late and especially refined end stage of the Ars Subtilior. Indeed, it
decidedly exhibits the fin-de-sicle feeling that pervaded the ars subtilior.

In the context of this programme, the nature of the word-setting in En un

vergier should not escape mention. In Machauts De toutes flours (see
facsimile above), there is a balance between phrases of text enunciated at
a natural syllabic speed and vocal melismas without text, which is not
present in En un vergier, where the texts natural rhythm is stretched to
incomprehensibility. This characteristic, which one encounters often in
the ars subtilior, obscured the unstrained relationship of text and music
that one enjoys with Machaut. Arguably, in En un vergier, musical
decadence may have been a compositional intention, as the poem is
lacking in interest and beauty. In any case, its worth is as a beautiful
piece of music that vividly defines and inhabits its sound-world.
Puis quen oubli sui de vous (Rondeau) Guillaume de Machaut

Puis quen oubli sui de vous, dous amis,
Vie amoureuse et joie Dieu commant.
Mar vi le jour que mamour en vous mis,
Puis quen oubli sui de vous, dous amis.
Mais ce tenray que je vous ay promis,
Cest que jamais naray nul autre amant.
Puis quen oubli sui de vous, dous amis,
Vie amoureuse et joie Dieu commant.
Since I am forgotten by you, sweet friend,
I say goodbye to loving life and to joy.
Unhappily I recall the day I placed my love in you,
since I am forgotten by you, sweet friend.
But one thing I shall keep, my promise to you;
it is that I never shall have any other lover.
Since I am forgotten by you, sweet friend,
I say goodbye to loving life and to joy.

To me, the representative manifestations of Machauts musical personality

are not a constantly elevated disposition, not an appeal to what is beyond
the human scale, not a channelling of consuming emotion, but rather,
eloquence. For this, he attached importance above all to creativity and a
spirit of inventiveness, as many passages in his writings evince:

Car ce nest pas chose commune,

Eins est tres tout aussi comme une
Chose des autres separe,
Dont elle est assez mieux pare
De plaisir en audition
Pour lestrange condition
Qui est dite nouvellet.
Mais je lappelle estranget,
Pour ce quelle genroit plaisance
De nouvel en ma congnoissance.

For it is not a common thing,

it is very much as if it were
separated from all other things,
and so is better suited
to be pleasing when heard
because of the unfamiliar condition
which one calls novelty.
 But I name it strangeness,
for it generates pleasure
new to my knowledge.

To be pleasing was an expression that Machaut often used to describe

the qualities for which he strove. In his Prologue, an account of his own
creative process, he further associated these qualities with being in a
pleasant state of mind himself. He writes:

Et son dit
Que li tristes cuers doit mieux faire
Que li joieus, cest tort a faire,
Ne je ne my puis accorder.

And if one says that the sorrowful hearts should do this better
than the joyous, it would be a misdeed no, I could not agree!

The rondeau Puis quen oubli is, even for an explorer of nouvellet and
estranget, unusual indeed, especially for one, for its striking feature
is the suppression of creativity. The music and the poem instil the reader
and the listener with a sense of near-uniformity. The muted, elusive
differences that give it life seem, in their repetition, to lead us down a
spiral into nothingness.

Is this not an exception that proves the rule? Is not the depressiveness of
the music, expressed by the resolute contrary of exuberant creativity, a
metaphor for the depressiveness of the poem?

Beyond obvious indicators of character, such as the unusually low vocal

tessitura (in contrast to the high tessitura of the ecstatic En un vergier), or
the halting movement punctuated by long pauses, this haunting piece
invites us to find meaning at a meta-musical level.
Walsingham William Byrd (c.1540 - 1623)

Byrds vocal music exhibits a conscious connection with its texts. His
own writings on the subject, more than those of other composers in a
comparable style, emphasise this aspect of composition. The author of
the phrase music, framed to the life of the words elaborated, in the
preface to Gradualia (1605-1607), a collection of works on sacred texts:

In these words, as I have learned by experience, there is such a

profound and mysterious power that to one thinking about things
divine, diligently and earnestly pondering them, all the most
fitting ideas occur as if of themselves and freely offer themselves
to the mind which is not indolent or apathetic.

The theme of Walsingham, a Catholic pilgrimage existing since the 13th

century destroyed in 1538 in the Reformation, would indeed be a
powerful one, especially for a composer with Byrds association to
Catholicism. His Masses are obvious manifestations of this; recently, it
has become increasingly recognised that many of his motets also contain
covert recusant meanings. Moreover, it was a theme that fit the affinity of
Byrds disposition for gravity, already remarked in his time. Even outside
his elegiac works, which are generally among his most moving, his view
is an idealising and dignifying one.

It may thus seem incongruous that Byrd was also the father of a genre
which epitomised lightheartedness: the keyboard variation. In the way
that he and his school developed it, it became a vehicle for virtuosity,
almost always underlain by dance rhythm. Though Byrds variations are to
be taken seriously because of the complex contrapuntal craft that they
exhibit in a purity and perfection rarely encountered in any other music,
profundity of expression is not typical of the genre.
We may appreciate in hindsight that it was the combination of weighty
content and creative technical mastery which enabled the creation of one
of the most all-embracing works of the Virginalists.

Illustration: Facsimile of the opening line of Byrds Walsingham in My Ladye

Nevells Booke. The title here, Have with you to Walsingham, might refer to
another version of the ballad As I went to Walsingham / to the shrine with
speed, which does also fit the tune perfectly.

Photo: remains of Walsingham Abbey.
5 Chorale Preludes Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
Der Tag, der ist so freudenreich, BWV 605
Vom Himmel hoch, da komm ich her, BWV 738
Erbarm dich mein, o Herre Gott, BWV 721
Jesus Christus, unser Heiland, BWV 666
Alle Menschen mssen sterben, BWV 643

Lutheran chorales induced the development of a defining Baroque form:

the chorale prelude. Compositionally, its origin appears to be connected
with the highly developed practice of the English virginalists notably
Thomas Tallis (c.1505-1585), John Blitheman (1525-1591), William Byrd,
and John Bull (1562-1628) of keyboard pieces upon Latin hymns. The
new genre of the chorale fantasy was characterised by a combination of
the virtuosity and pattern-spinning that propel Tallis famous Felix
namque to hallucinating heights with Protestant ideals of sobriety and
clarity. An early master of this style was Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck
(1562-1621), whose keyboard writing continued the tradition of Byrd and
his school while inspiring the new manners of the Baroque.

In hindsight, Johann Sebastian Bachs work can be viewed as having

summarised the development of the chorale prelude, much as Machauts
had done in an entirely different area. At the same time, both Bach and
Machaut made their respective forms very much their own, and realised
therein the potential of personal expression. Bachs chorale preludes
exhibit a striking variety in affect; they are not dry elaborations of the
chorale melodies compositional possibilities, as one could assume from
their archaising musical language. The accompanying voices do not only
provide polyphony rather, they set moods, by suggesting feelings or
images contained in the chorale texts, translated into musical symbols.
Through this engagement with the world of evocations and implications,
Bach expresses his unique personal perspective on the texts.
Der Tag, der ist so freudenreich
Aller Kreature,
Den Gottes Sohn vom Himmelreich
ber die Nature
Von einer Jungfrau ist geborn,
Maria du bist ausserkorn,
Dass du Mutter wrest.
Was geschah so wunderlich?
Gottes Sohn vom Himmelreich,
Der ist Mensch geboren.
O hail this brightest day of days,
All good Christian people!
For Christ hath come upon our ways,
Ring it from the steeple!
Of maiden pure is He the Son;
For ever shall thy praise be sung,
Christ's fair mother Mary!
Ever was there news so great?
God's own Son from heaven's high state
is born the Son of Mary!
(Translation: Charles Sanford Terry)

Illustration: Facsimile of the autograph of the beginning of the chorale prelude

Der Tag, der ist so freudenreich (BWV 605), from the Orgelbchlein.

Two symbolic elements are to be discerned (examine facsimile above):

bottom left, a stately step-ladder, representing the descent from heaven
which is the texts topic; above it, an aggregation of highly active figures
(in the middle between the staves), representing joy.

It is characteristic that such symbolic elements are not introduced

sequentially or rhetorically, but rather are present from the beginning. As
in Bachs cantatas, hermeneutic complexity is achieved by the creation of
an all-encompassing tableau or texture.
 Vom Himmel hoch, da komm ich her. From Heaven above to earth I come,
Ich bring euch gute neue Mr, To bear good news to every home;
Der guten Mr bring ich so viel, Glad tidings of great joy I bring,
Davon ich singn und sagen will. Whereof I now will say and sing.

Euch ist ein Kindlein heut geborn To you, this night, is born a Child
Von einer Jungfrau auserkorn, Of Mary, chosen mother mild;
Ein Kindelein, so zart und fein, This tender Child of lowly birth,
Das soll eur Freud und Wonne sein. Shall be the joy of all your earth.

Es ist der Herr Christ, unser Gott, Tis Christ our God, who far on high
Der will euch fhrn aus aller Not, Had heard your sad and bitter cry;
Er will eur Heiland selber sein, Himself will your Salvation be,
Von allen Snden machen rein. Himself from sin will make you free.

Er bringt euch alle Seligkeit, He brings those blessings long ago

Die Gott der Vater hat bereit, Prepared by God for all below;
Da ihr mit uns im Himmelreich That in His heavenly kingdom blest
Sollt leben nun und ewiglich. You may with us forever rest.
(Translation: Catherine Winkworth)

Von Himmel hoch, da komm ich her (BWV 738) is another perspective
on the Nativity, expressed with a wondrous countenance. The symbolic
descending-step figure, which we had also encountered in Der Tag, der
ist so freudenreich, is integrated into a gentle flowing stream (coloured):

Example: the opening measures of Von Himmel hoch, da komm ich her (BWV 738).
Erbarm dich mein, o Herre Gott, Have mercy on me, Lord my God,
nach deiner gron Barmherzigkeit, Of kindness Thou hast ever more,
wasch ab, mach rein mein Missetat, Cleanse my offenses with Thy blood,
ich kenn mein Snd und ist mir leid. I own my sin, it grieves me sore.
Allein ich dir gesndigt hab, Ive sinned against Thy whole command,
das ist wider mich stetiglich. This truth confronts me constantly;
Das Bs vor dir mag nicht bestehn. Before Thee evil cannot stand,
Du bleibest gerecht, ob du urteilest mich. And Thou art just to punish me.
(Translation: Matthew Carver)

The list of composers who interpreted Erbarm dich mein, o Herre Gott
reads like a pantheon of church musicians, featuring names such as
Sweelinck, Heinrich Schtz (1585-1672), Samuel Scheidt (1587-1654),
Heinrich Scheidemann (c.1595-1663), Johann Pachelbel (1653-1706),
and Dietrich Buxtehude (c.1640-1707) indeed almost all notable
composers of that tradition have left their own versions. Through them,
this series of notes gave rise to elaborate structures and treatments. Upon
it were written fantasies, variations, fugues, cantatas, and even a mass.

The most memorable product of this microcosm of baroque Protestant

music is, remarkably, perhaps its simplest. Bachs Erbarm dich mein, o
Herre Gott (BWV 721), sets aside the traditional art of surrounding the
chorale melody with atmospheric, symbolic, or technical elements.
Rather, it is little more than a harmonisation, which seems to grow out of
the latent emotions of the melody, so that the pieces whole expression is
carried by the chant itself. Bachs unparalleled genius in the chorale
prelude is witnessed by the fact that this hackneyed series of notes had to
wait for him in order for its extraordinarily touching intrinsic cantabile
nature to be realised.

Illustration: the first two lines of the chorale melody.

Jesus Christus, unser Heiland, Christ Jesus, our Redeemer born,
Der von uns den Gotteszorn wandt, Who from us did Gods anger turn,
Durch das bitter Leiden sein - Through His sufferings sore and main,
Half er uns aus der Hllen Pein. Did help us all out of hell-pain.
Die Frucht soll auch nicht ausbleiben: But bear fruit, or lose thy labour:
Deinen Nchsten sollst du lieben, Take thou heed thou love thy neighbour;
Da er dein genieen kann, That thou food to him mayst be,
Wie dein Gott hat an dir getan. As thy God makes Himself to thee.
(Translation: George Macdonald)
Jesus Christus, unser Heiland (BWV 666) is in Bachs last chorale prelude
collection, one of the comprehensive works of his last years like the Mass
and the Art of Fugue. As befitting its place in Bachs uvre, this chorale
prelude has a character of a compendium. It is based on an old structural
principle, shared by Byrds consort songs and by many early chorale
preludes: each phrase of the chorale appears following a polyphonic
fantasy introducing the phrases melody. Here, the ever increasing vitality
of these fantasies with each successive line of the text leads to exaltation.

Alle Menschen mssen sterben,
alles Fleisch vergeht wie Heu,
was da lebet muss verderben,
soll es andern werden neu.
Dieser Leib der muss verwesen
wenn er ewig soll genesen
der so grossen Herrlichkeit,
die den Frommen ist bereit.
All men living are but mortal,
Yea, all flesh must fade as grass;
Only through deaths gloomy portal
To eternal life we pass.
This frail body here must perish
Ere the heavnly joys it cherish,
Ere it gain the free reward
For the ransomed of the Lord.
(Translation: Catherine Winkworth)

There is a close connection between Bachs chorale preludes and his

cantatas, as many chorale preludes are arrangements of cantata
movements. The cantatas encapsulate his musical personality, manifested
by the way in which he interprets the words through music. Particularly
compelling is his engagement with death, which often inspired the most
developed musical tapestries. The chorale prelude Alle Menschen mssen
sterben (BWV 643) contemplates death with acceptance and radiant
anticipation, so characteristic of Bach as we know him from his cantatas.
Two Episodes from Lenaus Faust Franz Liszt (1811 - 1886)
Der nchtliche Zug
Der Tanz in der Dorfschenke

Programme music, defined as music written to correspond to a story, has

long existed. The Westminster Abbey organist John Munday (1555-1630)
affirmed the stereotype of his nationality with his Fantasy on the Weather
(which his successor Edward Naylor qualified three hundred years later
as rubbish). Consigned still more generally to the category rubbish
are the essays of Beethoven and Dussek. Even regarded sympathetically,
such instrumental programme music could not tap into the emotional
possibilities opened by earnestness. Rarely was its appeal not to be found
in its informal manner. Even Johann Sebastian Bachs Departure of his
Beloved Brother, while it elicits truly touching feeling, does not open the
gates of universal emotion.

Franz Liszts programme music was born of more elevated aspirations. Its
approach was characterised, in his own words, by his regarding as
subject material not the heros deeds but his inner feelings. This vision
was certainly inspired by Hector Berlioz (1803-1869), to whom
admiration and friendship bound Liszt. Berlioz preface to his grand
programmatic composition Romo et Juliette is an apologia as well as a
manifesto for programme music:

La sublimit mme de cet amour en rendait la peinture si dangereuse

pour le musicien, quil a d donner sa fantaisie une latitude que le
sens positif des paroles chantes ne lui et pas laisse, et recourir la
langue instrumentale, langue plus riche, plus varie, moins arrte, et,
par son vague mme, incomparablement plus puissante en pareil cas.
 The very sublimity of this love made its depiction so dangerous
for the musician that he needed to allow his imagination a
freedom which the literal meaning of the words sung would have
denied him. Hence the recourse to instrumental language, a
language which is richer, more varied, less finite, and through its
very imprecision incomparably more powerful in such a
situation. (Translation: Michel Austin)

It did not escape Berlioz that this approach would put a strain on
comprehensibility and accessibility:

Les morceaux qui sadressent seulement limagination nont donc point

de public. La scne instrumentale suivante est dans ce cas, et je pense
quil faut la supprimer toutes les fois que cette symphonie ne sera pas
excute devant un auditoire dlite auquel le cinquime acte de la
tragdie de Shakespeare est extrmement familier et dont le
sentiment potique est trs lev.

Pieces which speak solely to the imagination thus have no

public. The following instrumental scene falls in this case, and I
think that one should not play it, unless the symphony is
performed before an audience of the elite, to whom the fifth act
of Shakespeares tragedy is extremely familiar, and whose poetic
sentiment is very elevated.

Liszt would have been no stranger to these thoughts, as he solved the

problems of the genre that owes its existence to him the Symphonic
Poem, the ultimate realisation of Music as Poetry.

Like Liszts Symphonic Poems, the Two Episodes from Lenaus Faust are
orchestral programme music. The first of the two episodes, Der nchtliche
Zug (The Night Procession), is fundamentally a line-by-line illustration
of Lenaus poem. The second, Der Tanz in der Dorfschenke [modern
spelling: Dorfschnke] (The Dance in the Village Inn), puts the listener
in medias res, into the atmosphere of recklessness and immoderation that
the text evokes. Quite independently of Liszt's wishes, it has taken on a
life of its own as Mephisto-Waltz; nevertheless, it is through the
context of Lenaus poem that its wilful crassness should be appreciated.

The set of two pieces is framed by appearances of a nightingale

incidentally, a favourite of the ars subtilior represented musically by the
tremolo of its song.

Example: Nightingales in Jean Vaillants Par maintes foys (Image: Chantilly

manuscript, compiled c.1395) and Liszts Der Tanz in der Dorfschenke.

It was of great importance to Liszt himself that the relationship of text and
music in these pieces be made obvious in their publication. In sending
the pieces to his publisher Julius Schuberth, he instructed:

As I noted in the scores, the poems Der nchtliche Zug and Der
Tanz in der Dorfschenke must be printed in front, in the
 orchestral as well as piano scores. It will not cause you in Leipzig
much trouble to procure Lenaus Faust!

A few rounds of correspondence later, Liszt left no doubt about his

displeasure upon seeing that it had not been done:

The two episodes from Lenaus Faust have reached me.

Regretfully, I cannot particularly thank you for them Without
my engaging in any further discussion, allow me, my honoured,
inveterate friend, to set before you my plea. With the next
mailing of scores, I hope to receive the proof that you have
properly fulfilled my intentions.

Example: the integration of Lenaus poem into the musical text of Liszts Der
nchtliche Zug. Each section of the music corresponds to a passage of the poem.
Famously, Liszt subscribed to the idea that new wine required new
vessels. This was particularly impressively and consequentially realised
in his reinvention of the orchestra. It is said that after Liszt took over the
direction of Weimars orchestra, he met at length with its members, to
learn about, contemplate, and develop their instruments possibilities.
The result was to redefine their roles according to a new vision of what
they effectively expressed. There would no longer be an essential divide
between what an instrument expressed as a soloist in a concerto or in
chamber music, and what it was called upon to represent in the
orchestra. In Liszts orchestra, each instrument was emancipated.

A performance note on one of his symphonic poems describes how this

flexibility of the musicians roles fit into his vision:

Le nerf vital dune belle excution symphonique gt principalement dans le

comprhension de luvre reproduite, que le chef dorchestre doit surtout
possder et communiquer, dans la manire de ... veiller tantt tablir
lquilibre entre les divers instruments, tantt les faire ressortir soit isolment
soit par groupes, car tel moment il convient dintonner ou de marquer
simplement les notes, mais dautres, il sagit de phraser, de chanter, et mme
de dclamer. Cest au chef quil appartient dindiquer chacun des membres de
lorchestre la signification du rle quil a remplir.

The lifeblood of a beautiful symphonic performance mainly lies

in the understanding of the reproduced work, which the
conductor has above all to possess and communicate, by either
establishing a balance between the various instruments or by
bringing them out either individually or in groups, because at
certain moments it is fitting to intone or to bring forth simply the
notes, but in other moments, one is to phrase, to sing, and even
to declaim. It is the conductors responsibility to indicate to each
member of the orchestra the meaning of the role he has to fulfil.
This aesthetic shows itself unmistakably in moments where one
instrument carries alone the expressive thread of the piece. Such
moments bring into the realm of the orchestra the intense individual
emotion of the operatic or instrumental soloist.

Liszt was also the renewer of the art of orchestration in a different aspect:
sound-colours that created moments of instant ecstasy became a main
means of expression. For example, splitting the orchestra into many
separate groups playing simultaneously but incongruously resulted in
tutti sounds so otherworldly, that their mere appearance was exhilarating.

Example: a remarkable kaleidoscopic texture from Liszts symphonic poem

Mazeppa, accompanying a long espressivo dolente melody of oboes, English
horn, bass clarinet, bassoons, and trumpets, all in unison.

Liszt created an orchestral language synthesising two paradigms that he

reimagined: the orchestra as a set of soloists, and the orchestra as one
instrument. There is, however, another instrument which, also thanks to
Liszt, came to enjoy a comparable breadth of possibilities of expression
the piano. He took advantage of the fruits of his inventiveness in
transcribing much of his storytelling orchestral music for the piano.

Lenaus poem: these lines describe Fausts feelings as he, riding with a gloomy
disposition through the night, encounters the solemn procession. The impression
builds up to all-encompassing emotions.

In the passage of Der nchtliche Zug reproduced above, Liszt interprets

the build-up by overwhelming the senses with an opening and deepening
of perspective. A sublime beauty is made by the disposition of the full
orchestra in its softest glowing hues. Liszt translates this for the piano by
expanding the texture to fill the whole range of the instrument at once:

Illustration: Liszt creates a rapturous sound-texture: from the low bass to the high treble,
and everything in between.

Kit Armstrong, October 2015

Born in Los Angeles in 1992, Kit
Armstrong started composing at five
and shortly after that began piano
studies. Today he performs in the
most prestigious concert halls in the
world.
In November 2015, Sony Classical
will release Kit Armstrongs new solo
album Liszt: Symphonic Scenes. His
previous album on Sony, with works
by Bach, Ligeti and Armstrong, was released in September 2013. For Kulturradio (RBB)
it was one of the very few CDs that the world was waiting for; NDR Kultur described
it as a debut album full of emotions.
Kit Armstrongs compositions are published by Edition Peters. A six time winner of the
ASCAP Foundations Morton Gould Young Composers Award, he has received
commissions from the Leipzig Gewandhaus, the Volkswagen Autostadt Movimentos
festival, the Philharmonic Orchestra Kiel, and BASF Culture Management, among
others. His piano trio Stop Laughing, Were rehearsing! was released on CD by the
label GENUIN.
Kit Armstrong studied music at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia and at the
Royal Academy of Music in London. At the age of seven, he started studying natural
sciences at various universities including the University of Pennsylvania and Imperial
College London. He earned his masters degree in pure mathematics at the University
of Paris VI.
Kit Armstrong received Schleswig-Holstein Music Festivals Leonard Bernstein Award in
2010. Kit Armstrong won the WEMAG-Soloist Prize at the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern
Festival in 2014.
At the age of 13, Kit Armstrong came to know Alfred Brendel, who since then has
guided him as teacher and mentor and ascribes to him an understanding of the great
piano works that combines freshness and subtlety, emotion and intellect. The unique
relationship between Armstrong and Brendel was captured in the film Set the Piano
Stool on Fire by the British director Mark Kidel.
In 2013, Kit Armstrong acquired the glise Sainte-Thrse in Hirson, France, with the
plan of reawakening this disused church, a unique historical Art Deco monument, as a
concert hall and creative centre for culture. Following its inauguration in 2014, it has
become home to events featuring imaginative programmes and renowned artists.