Dramatic openings
They originally heralded an on-stage drama, but ultimately they inspired purely orchestral narratives. It’s high time to revive the overture, says Tom Service
No concert used to be complete without their scintillation of sound and story, and yet today, they find themselves in musical stables reserved for clapped-out warhorses, the final staging post before orchestral oblivion: what happened to overtures? Why don’t we hear Reznicek’s Donna Diana or Johann Strauss’s Fledermaus or Kabalevsky’s Colas Breugnon any more?
The art of overture composition starts in the opera houses of the 17th century. Claudio Monteverdi’s overture for L’orfeo is a brief and brassy fanfare that says: ‘Pay attention! Listen to this!’ Throughout the rest of the 17th century and into the 18th, the operatic overture became a more extended warm-up for the instrumentalists and the audience in Jean-baptiste Lully’s operas in Paris and Antonio Vivaldi’s in Italy. An indulgent orchestral upbeat was necessary before curtain-up, not least because a large proportion of the aristocratic punters wouldn’t dream of turning up at the start of the opera: the overture was a bridge between worlds, a vamp-till-ready across real life to the fantastical world of theatre.
Mozart went furthest of all in making that bridging of worlds audible. In his overture to The Marriage of Figaro – written at the last minute, as his operatic overtures usually were – Mozart composes the sound of audience hubbub and excitement in a febrile, bustling pianissimo at the start of the overture, before an irresistible forte crashes in to claim our attention.
In the early 19th century, as well as the barnstorming popularity of Rossini’s overtures, the seismic moment for overture-composition is the fourfold experimentation of Beethoven’s pieces for the opera now known as Fidelio – formerly Leonora. His three Leonora overtures are successively more amibitous remixes and retellings of the entire plot of the opera, using only the medium of orchestral sound. Beethoven’s final attempt, the overture for Fidelio, is the most compact and the most efficient as an operatic opener, but it’s the third Leonora Overture that’s the most significant. Leonora
No. 3 showed the narrative power an orchestra could achieve on its own, and was a template for the 19th century’s concert overtures, from Mendelssohn’s Hebrides to Brahms’s Academic Festival, instrumental pieces that are both sufficient unto themselves yet tell emotional stories that can only be realised through orchestral sound. No. 3 also inspired the blazing freedom and imagination of Liszt’s symphonic poems, and it’s the progenitor of Richard Strauss’s and Sibelius’s tone poems too.
It’s all that imagination in all those overtures that we’re missing in a world of supposedly more innovative orchestral programming: so let’s bring these dazzling concert openers back from the glue factory of music history to the racecourse of the repertoire once again, from Suppé to Lehár, from Auber to Offenbach!
Leonora No.3 inspired the blazing imagination of Liszt, Richard Strauss and Sibelius
Francis Jackson Born 1917
Organist, Choirmaster, Composer
Jackson’s advanced years meant that he was one of the last in recent memory to have worked alongside some of English church music’s great figures. One such great was the organist of York Minster and composer Edward Bairstow, who in 1929 heard an 11-year-old Jackson’s talent at the piano and enrolled him as a chorister at the Minster, without requiring him to serve a probationary year. Jackson regarded Bairstow as one of his foremost influences (he wrote Bairstow’s biography) and continued studying with him until his call-up to the army in 1940, serving in North Africa until the end of the war. Returning to York, he slid onto the assistant organist bench without interview – after all, Bairstow himself was his referee. When Bairstow died in 1946, Jackson was immediately appointed organist and director of music. He stayed at the Minster until
1982, where he become renowned not only for his sure hand with the choir, but also his phenomenal playing, evident in several acclaimed recordings. Jackson was president of the Royal College of Organists from 1972-74, and was awarded a CBE in 2007.
Maria Ewing Born 1950 Mezzo-soprano, Soprano Here was an opera star who turned heads, and occasionally raised eyebrows. Ewing’s dramatic prowess and comic timing saw her dominate the stage in a number of memorable roles in the US, UK and Europe, while her voice sometimes divided opinion. Whether it was the style of her singing, or the fact she switched from mezzo-soprano to soprano roles later in her career, critics and fans often bumped heads. She certainly won’t be forgotten. Born in Detroit, Michigan, Ewing studied with Jennie Tourel and Eleanor Steber among others before making her stage debut at the 1973 Ravinia Festival. Three years later, she appeared at The Met for the first time and was a regular presence there. She worked often with director Peter Hall (to whom she was married from 1982-90), turning in dazzling performances at Glyndebourne, including Poppea and Carmen, not to mention a 1986 appearance as Strauss’s Salome in Los Angeles that few who saw it are likely to forget.
Roger Tapping Born 1960 Violist You could take any one of Roger Tapping’s ensemble tenures as a career high point. A founding member of the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, the English-born violist also played in the English Chamber Orchestra and the Allegri Quartet. But it was perhaps his move to the US in 1995 to join the Takács Quartet that would see his star rise fully. With the Takács he embarked on years of acclaimed concerts and recording projects, including celebrated cycles of Bartók and Beethoven for Decca. Many plaudits followed, including a Grammy. In 2013 Tapping joined the staff at the Juilliard School, having already become a firm fixture at the New England Conservatory, and took over from Samuel Rhodes in the famed Juilliard String Quartet.
Dale Clevenger Born 1940 Horn player A popular figure in American music, the Grammy-winning Dale Clevenger served an impressive 47 years with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra as principal horn. His versatility meant he was as at home in the big-boned repertoire of the great composers as he was playing jazz or in chamber ensembles. Born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Clevenger began his musical life as a young trumpeter before switching to the french horn. He studied at Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh and began his professional life in the ranks of the American Symphony Orchestra and the Symphony of the Air. He also found time to conduct, with 14 years on the podium with the Elmhurst Symphony not to mention guestconducting appearances across North America and in Europe.
Also remembered…
Tom Hammond (born 1974) was a British conductor – most recently with the St Albans Symphony – who studied under Charles Mackerras and founded the Hertfordshire Festival of Music.
Finnish composer and teacher Paavo Heininen (born 1938) studied under both Rautavaara and Lutos awski and was fondly regarded as the ‘Grand Old Man of Finnish Modernism’.