Jupiter Players Perform Donizetti, Kotzwara, Wolf and Schumann

On Monday, the Jupiter Players performed their final recital of the season at Good Shepherd Church on West 66th Street.  The theme of the recital was Divine Madness and the ensemble accordingly performed a number of works by  composers whose lives had been tinged by mental illness - Gaetano Donizetti, Frantisek Kotzwara, Hugo Wolf, and Schumann.  Personally, I don't believe that it was at all appropriate to build a musical program around the anguish these individuals suffered, and I most likely would not have attended had I realized beforehand the implications of the stated title.  As it was, the selections themselves were for the most part highly accomplished and enjoyable to hear; they are the legacy of genius these poor men left behind.

The program opened with Donizetti's Larghetto in C major for flute, bassoon and piano (c. 1819).  It was for his bel canto operas, of course, that Donizetti gained immortality.  After the retirement of Rossini and the premature death of Bellini, Donizetti became, at least until the advent of Verdi, the premiere opera composer in Europe.  In spite of this success, he came to a terrible end.  His health broke down and he was afflicted by severe mental illness as a result of having contracted syphilis; he spent his last years in a sanitarium before dying in 1848 at age fifty.  The works he left behind included not only the magnificent comic operas L'Elisir d'Amor and Don Pasquale but also great historical works such as the three "Tudor" operas staged last season at the Met.  Donizetti composed a number of instrumental works as well, but these are not nearly so well known nor are they often performed.  The present trio, apparently composed when Donizetti was first beginning his career in Bergamo, is such an obscure piece that I could not find any reference to it even on the IMSLP site, the first time I can remember that having happened.  For all that, this was a pleasing work filled with operatic overtones.  Several of the passages could easily have been transformed into arias.

The Larghetto was followed by Six Minuets, WoO 9 (c. 1795) by Beethoven, arranged here for two violins and cello.  The lack of opus number would indicate that the composer himself did not hold these dance pieces in the highest regard.  Thoroughly correct but strangely lifeless studies of the Classical minuet, they were not particularly impressive examples of Beethoven's apprenticeship to Haydn.

The next work was Wolf's Intermezzo in E-flat major for string quartet (1887).  Hugo Wolf was another musical misfit.  Temperamentally unable to hold a job for very long, he was often despondent and so ill humored in the reviews he wrote that he was nicknamed the "Wild Wolf."  Like Donizetti, he died prematuresly from syphilis after first having suffered a mental collapse.  A disciple of Wagner, his music often, as in the present piece, sounds surprisingly in advance of its time.  Unlike the far more popular Italian Serenade, the Intermezzo moves uneasily from the melodic to sudden harsh outbursts.  A review in The Strad describes it well: "Sometimes grim but often powerful music from a troubled late Romantic."

The first half of the recital then ended with a performance of Kotzwara's The Battle of Prague, Op. 23 for piano with violin, cello, and drum (1778).  Kotzwara is one of those shadowy musical figures most often described as "colorful."  A Czech by birth, he somehow ended up in London where he eked out a living by composing simple chamber works for amateurs.  He also apparently supplemented his income by passing off his own compositions as works by Haydn.  Wolf is remembered today for only two things.  The first is The Battle of Prague itself, a lively piece commemorating the 1757 battle between Prussia and Austria-Hungary; it contains a number of sound effects as well as quotes from Rule Brittania and Turkish marches and was an extremely popular piece of music in its day, an unlikely favorite of Jane Austen.  The second thing for which Kotzwara is remembered is, rather unfortunately, his unusual manner of death.  In the course of a tryst with a Westminster prostitute, Kotzwara had the dubious distinction of becoming the first recorded case of death by auto-asphyxiation.

After intermission, the musicians returned to close the program with Schumann's Piano Quintet in E-flat major Op. 44 (1842).  In an earlier post, I compared it to the Piano Quartet, Op. 47 and wrote as follows:

"In general, and to oversimplify, the Quintet has a bigger sound that is at times almost symphonic while the Quartet is a more intimate work. The Quintet's opening movement, marked allegro brillante, is designed to impress the listener while the funeral march that follows is the very essence of Romanticism. And at the end is the vibrant finale that is among the finest chamber movements Schumann composed during his short career. In addition, this is the first major piece to pair the piano with string quartet, and Schumann deserves credit for having established with it a new musical genre. It was Mendelssohn, filling in for an ailing Clara Schumann, who premiered the work at a private gathering and his suggestions led Schumann to make a number of revisions before the public premiere (at which Clara did play), but the honors are all due to Schumann himself."

Schumann himself succumbed to madness in 1854 after first having attempted to drown himself in the Rhine.  He died two years later while still institutionalized.

In spite of the morbid theme, the performances at this recital were excellent. The musicianship, including that of the two guest artists - Alexander Kobrin piano, and Josef Spacek violin - was of the highest level.  The Jupiter Players' programming is often too obscure for my taste, however, and for that reason I attended far fewer performances this season than last.  I believe programs should be well balanced in the sense that they contain pieces familiar to the audience (and not in the transcriptions for other instruments that are routinely presented here) combined with those that are not so often performed.  On the other hand, the ensemble has a very loyal following who are quite enthusiastic no matter how little known the works played may be, so perhaps the fault lies with me rather than with the company.