26-27 Classics 3 – Program Notes: The Joffrey Ballet
7:30 PM | Santander Preforming Arts Center
Andrew Constantine Conductor
Reading Symphony Orchestra
Carnival Overture, Op. 92
Antonín Dvořák (1841-1904)
Composed in 1891.
Originally titled “Life”, Dvorak’s Carnival Overture was the central part of a triptych of works he completed in 1892. The companion works were In Nature’s Realm and Othello and their mission was to depict Nature, Life and Love.
Imbued with the dance rhythms and folk melodies of his native Bohemia, Carnival begins in the most arresting and electrifying manner and its opening syncopated melody, accompanied by tambourine and cymbals, hurls us into the street’s vibrant festivities. In the composer’s own words, “The wanderer reaches the city at nightfall, where a carnival of pleasure reigns supreme. On every side is heard the clangor of instruments, mingled with shouts of joy and the unrestrained hilarity of people giving vent to their feelings in the songs and dance tunes.” A slower central section, where Dvorak features his beloved English horn alongside violin and flute solos depict, again in the composer’s own words, “a pair of straying lovers.” All this before a return to the music of the raucous opening and culmination with a coda section which seeks to crank up the energy!
© 2026 Andrew Constantine
The Pavane in F♯ minor, Op. 50
Gabriel Fauré (1845-1924)
Composer in 1887 and premiered in Paris in 1888.
One of the foremost composers of his generation, Gabriel Faure was born in 1845 into a cultured but not overly musical family. At the time of his death in 1924 he had risen to being head of the Paris Conservatoire, organist at L’église de la Madeleine and, deserving of a state funeral.
Composing over such an extended lifetime, Faure witnessed first hand the music of Chopin, his friend and mentor Saint-Saens, the music of Mahler and Stravinsky, and through to the emergence of Schoenberg and even jazz!
His most celebrated works are his Requiem and tonight's work, the Pavane. This pavane, in F# minor, was originally written as a short piano piece in 1887 - a pavane being a slow, courtly processional dance of Spanish origin. And although Faure described it as, “elegant, assuredly, but not particularly important”, it was obviously important enough to him that he soon created a version for small orchestra and then a version that included an optional chorus and also dancers. It was described by the Faure scholar Jean-Michel Nectoux thus: ”there will be few to deny that it is one of the most attractive of his lesser works: the flute theme, once heard, is not easily forgotten”.
© 2026 Andrew Constantine
Listen
The Comedians, Op. 26
Dmitry Kabalevsky (1904-1987)
Composed in 1938-39.
The name Dmitri Kabalevsky is probably unfamiliar to most but he occupied a significant position within Russian and Soviet music for the greater part of the twentieth century.
Born in St. Petersburg in 1904, but thereafter moving to Moscow at a young age, Dmitri was initially directed by his family toward becoming a mathematician like his father Boris. However, he showed a greater inclination towards the arts. After studying during his teens at the Academic Music College in Moscow, he moved on to the Moscow Conservatory in 1925. By the age of 27 he was already a senior lecturer at the Conservatory and by 34 was a full-time professor.
Kabalevsky composed prolifically throughout his life in many musical forms and, particularly during the 1930s, was renowned alongside Shostakovich and Prokofiev for his film music. But there was one area, music created to attract children toward music, that was a particular passion of Kabalevsky.
Around 1938, Kabalevsky wrote the incidental music for a children's play called The Inventor and the Comedians. Intended for the Central Children’s Theatre in Moscow, and based upon a play about the German inventor Johannes Gutenberg by the writer Mark Daniel, it incorporates a group of travelling buffoons. In 1940, Kabalevsky chose ten short numbers from the incidental music and arranged them into a concert suite. The most celebrated and familiar to most people, comes second, The Comedians’ Galop.
The Swan of Tuonela, Op.22/2
Jean Sibelius (1865-1957)
Composed in 1893 and premiered in 1896. It was first recorded by Leopold Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1929.
Coming only a year after the energetic Carnival Overture by Dvorak, and also making full use of the lyrical qualities of the Cor anglais, Sibelius’ gorgeous and lamentfully mournful The Swan of Tuonela from 1893, could hardly be a greater contrast to the work we began this concert with.
As part of the Lemminkainen Suite (a collection of four tone poems written by Sibelius to depict the legends of Finland’s national epic, the Kalevala), the music is a transcendental image of the mystical swan floating through Tuonela, the realm of the dead. Though the swan is sacred, the hero Lemminkainen has been instructed to kill the bird. He is, however, killed by a poisoned arrow on his way there - only in the next part of the story is he restored to life.
© 2026 Andrew Constantine
Polovtsian Dances from Prince Igor
Alexander Borodin (1833-1887)
Composed in 1887 with the suite prepared by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and Alexander Glazunov in 1890.
As part of a collective attempt to establish a Russian ‘school’ of both musical style and language in the second part of the nineteenth century, five composers together became known as ‘The Five’ or ‘The Mighty Handful”. They were; Balakirev, Cesar Cui, Mussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakoff and Borodin. One of their stated objectives was to incorporate Russian folk music elements and shy away from the more traditional scope of western music. A noticeable absentee from this group was of course the one composer who really put Russian music on the map, Tchaikovsky. Posterity has treated “The Five’ with mixed reviews.
Born in 1833 in St. Petersburg, Alexander Borodin had a truly bizarre upbringing. As the illegitimate son of a Georgian nobleman he was unable to bear his father’s name. Instead he was registered as the son of one of his father’s serfs, Porfirio Borodin. Not until the age of seven did his father emancipate him from serfdom. After this he was able to live comfortably with his mother - who was never acknowledged as such, only as his ‘aunt’ - and, in time, became one of the most respected chemists of his day.
Music and composition were always regarded as a hobby for his spare time. Today he’s remembered for his symphonies, string quartets and Prince Igor, the opera left incomplete at his death in 1887. The Polovtsian Dances, probably his most popular work, are extracted from Act 2 of the opera and were shaped into a stand alone performing version by the composers Rimsky-Korsakoff and Glazounov in 1890.
After the capture of Igor, the nomadic invaders of Russia, the Cumans (Polovtsy), dance for the prince’s entertainment. A multitude of characters are involved in this exotic and dramatic scene which culminates in a whirling frenzy.
© 2026 Andrew Constantine
The Firebird 1919 Suite: Infernal Dance of King Kashchei, Berceuse, Finale
Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971)
Composed in 1910 and premiered the same year at the Opéra de Paris by Ballet Russes. Arranged by Stravinsky in suite form in 1919.
Without the legendary impresario Serge Diaghilev and his Ballet Russes, would Igor Stravinsky ever have emerged on the world stage as a composer and become the huge musical influence on the twentieth century that he was? We’ll never know, of course. But more than likely, the cachet and status he garnered in Paris as a young composer of three revolutionary ballet scores saved him from the infinitely more violent revolution which was soon to take place back in his homeland.
The Firebird was the first of the scores to be completed in 1910 - the others being, Petrushka (1911) and The Rite of Spring (1913). It tells of the downfall of the all-powerful, evil ogre, Kastchei the Deathless. Numerous knights have all been turned to stone whilst trying to rescue the young princesses held captive by Kastchei. Seeking a way around this fate for himself, the Crown Prince Ivan persuades the beautiful, glittering Firebird to assist him in his efforts to liberate the girls and destroy Kastchei’s world.
In 1919 Stravinsky created the first of a number of concert suites from the ballet - a wise move to ensure maintenance of copyright and to increase income from added public performances. Tonight we hear music from the suite which depicts the frenzied dance of Kastchei and his followers. After they exhaust themselves a lullaby, first heard in the bassoon, sends them all to sleep. This is the opportunity for Ivan to destroy the giant egg containing both Kastchei’s soul and his power. A gorgeous horn solo heralds in the sunlight and the triumph of good over evil.
© 2026 Andrew Constantine