Orchestre symphonique de MontréalCharles Dutoit

TCHAIKOVSKYThe Nutcracker

Aurora’s Wedding

Eloquence

PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893)

CD 1 66’25The Nutcracker

1 Ouverture 3’15

Act I, Scene 12 No. 1: Scène – L’Arbre de Noël 3’58

The Christmas tree 3 No. 2: Marche 2’264 No. 3: Petit galop des enfants et entrée des parents 2’24

Children’s galop and entrance of the parents5 No. 4: Scène dansante – L’entrée de Drosselmeyer et la distribution des jouets 5’41

Drosselmeyer’s arrival and distribution of presents6 No. 5: Scène – La presentation du Casse-Noisette 7’08

Danse GrossvaterThe Nutcracker and Grandfather dance

7 No. 6: Scène – Le depart des invités – La nuit 6’32Departure of the guests – night

8 No. 7: Scène – La bataille 3’19The battle

Act I, Scene 29 No. 8: Scène – Une forêt de sapins en hiver 3’35

A pine forest in winter0 No. 9: Valse des flocons de neige 6’37

Waltz of the snowflakes

Act II! No. 10: Scène – Le palais enchanté du Royaume des Douceurs 4’20

The enchanted palace of the Kingdom of Sweets@ No. 11: Scène – L’arrivée de Clara et Casse-Noisette 4’46

Arrival of Clara and the NutcrackerNo. 12: Divertissement

£ a. Le chocolat (Danse espagnole) 1’17Chocolate (Spanish dance)

$ b. Le café (Danse arabe) 3’16Coffee (Arabian dance)

% c. Le thé (Danse chinoise) 1’09Tea (Chinese dance)

^ d. Trepak (Dance russe) 1’08Russian dance

& e. Danse des mirlitons 2’24Dance of the mirlitons

* f. La Mère Cigogne et les polichinelles 2’51Mother Cigogne and the clowns

CD 2 68’591 No. 13: Valse des fleurs 6’50

Waltz of the flowers2 No. 14: Pas de deux – Le Prince et la Fée Dragée 5’42

The Prince and the Sugar-Plum FairyVar. 1 Tarantella

3 Var. 2 Danse de la Fée Dragée 3’44Dance of the Sugar-Plum FairyCoda

4 No. 15: Valse finale et Apothéose 5’24Final waltz and apotheosis

The Sleeping BeautyAurora’s Wedding

5 Introduction (Prologue) (Allegro vivo – Andante) 4’046 Polacca (Act III No. 22) (Allegro moderato e brilliante) 5’087 Pas de six (Prologue No. 3) (Adagio – Andante – Allegro vivo) 4’148 Var. 1: Candite (Allegro moderato) 0’509 Var. 2: Coulante. Fleur de Farine (Allegro) 0’310 Var. 3: Miettes qui tombent (Allegro moderato) 0’52! Var. 4: Canari qui chante (Moderato) 0’28@ Var. 5: Violente (Allegro molto vivace) 1’03

£ Var. 6: La Fée de Lilas (Tempo di valse) 1’05$ Scène (Act II No. 12) (Moderato) 1’01% b. Danse des duchesses (Moderato con moto. Tempo di Minuetto) 0’58^ e. Dance des marquises (Allegro non troppo) 0’48

Farandole (Act II No. 13)& a. Scène (Poco più vivo) 0’16* b. Danse (Allegro non troppo. Tempo di Mazurka) 1’20( Pas de quatre (Act III No. 23) (Allegro non tanto) 1’40) Pas de caractère (Act III No. 26) (Allegro moderato) 1’25¡ Pas de quatre (Act III No. 25) (Adagio) 1’49™ Var. 1 (Cendrillon et Fortuné) (Allegro. Tempo di valse) 1’03# Var. 2 (L’Oiseau bleu et la Princesse Florine) (Andantino) 0’42¢ Coda (Presto) 1’24∞ Coda (Act III No. 28) (Allegro vivace) 1’17§ Pas de deux (Aurore et Desiré) (Act III No. 28) (Allegretto) 0’10¶ Entrée (Allegro moderato) 1’37• Adagio (Andante non troppo) 4’18ª Finale (Act III No. 30) (Allegro brillante. Tempo di mazurka) 6’23º Apothéose (Andante molto maestoso) 2’26

Chœurs d’enfants de l’école FACE(director: Iwan Edwards)

Orchestre symphonique de MontréalCharles Dutoit

Total timing: 135’24

Now, more than a century after The Nutcrackerballet was first staged at St. Petersburg on 18December 1892, Tchaikovsky’s music is ever theone consistent element in the multifariousproductions that regularly take place around theworld; the music’s enduring charm and beguilingcharacter have endeared it to successivegenerations of listeners since it was composed inresponse to a commission from IvanVsevolozhsky, director of the Imperial Theatres,who hoped to replicate Tchaikovsky’s successwith The Sleeping Beauty and The Queen ofSpades, both premiered two years previously.

Perhaps Vsevolozhsky was hoping for the bestagain of both genres when he invitedTchaikovsky to compose an opera and a balletas a double-bill. On this he placed ‘all my hopesfor next season; this will be my chief attractionfor next winter’, he told the composer. Hishopes had to be shelved, however, whenTchaikovsky did not make good progress, andthe double-bill with the one-act opera, Iolanta,was actually a year late in reaching the stage.Even then, neither of the works concerned wasthe looked-for success at the time, nor has theopera been much performed since.

The ballet’s literary origins lie in one of the talesof Hoffmann, the same E.T.A. Hoffmann (1776-1822) whose often macabre stories furnished

another classic ballet in Coppélia (1870) andwho himself became the operatic hero ofOffenbach’s The Tales of Hoffmann (1881). Hisstory Nussknacker und Mäusekönig (TheNutcracker and the Mouse-King), written in1816, was freely adapted into French byAlexander Dumas père as L’Histoire d’un casse-noisette, and it was from this French versionthat a scenario for the ballet was devised, anddetailed suggestions about the length andcharacter of the dances given to the composerby Marius Petipa, St. Petersburg’s Marseilles-born ballet master.

Tchaikovsky’s composition was in any caseinterrupted by a prior commitment to aconducting tour in the USA, which took himaway in March 1891, when he was midwaythrough sketching the ballet’s first act. Hejourneyed via Paris, where he fortuitously hearddemonstrated by its inventor, Auguste Mustel,the celesta, and realised that its tinkling, bell-like tones might be the answer to the naggingproblem of what he called ‘the impossibility ofdepicting the Sugar-Plum Fairy in music’. In duecourse the celesta made the ‘Dance of theSugar-Plum Fairy’ instantly popular from thetime the orchestral Nutcracker Suite was firstplayed nine months in advance of the ballet.

The composer initially contemplated using toy

instruments after the manner of LeopoldMozart’s ‘Toy’ Symphony, but he discarded theidea in favour of more imaginativeorchestration, imparting a toy-like quality to theOverture, for instance, by excluding all low-register instruments, and making instrumentaltimbre and sonority a primary feature of themusical character. Unusual timbres areassociated with fantasy and magic, such as theentry of Drosselmeyer to the sound of theviolas, trombones and tuba with muted horns,the sinister midnight nocturne, and the battleof mice and toy soldiers. Tchaikovsky alsosought to strengthen what seemed to him aweak scenario by building key-sequences intoan arch-form: the Overture and Act I begin in Bflat major and the act ends in E major; Act Twoopens in E major and returns ultimately to Bflat, building a ‘circle of keys’ each a fifth apartin a balanced symmetry between the two acts.More use is made of folk-sources than inTchaikovsky’s other ballets, with French folksongs quoted in Nos. 3 and 12f, German in No.5 and a Georgian lullaby for the Arabian Dance(12b).

First rehearsals had not progressed very far inSt. Petersburg when Petipa fell ill, and the balletwas choreographed mostly by his assistant LevIvanov, whose name alone appeared in

connection with the premiere. The music wasbetter liked than the visual elements, and theballet was dropped after just fourteenperformances. It was occasionally revived, buttook all of 27 years just to reach Moscow. Thefirst full Nutcracker in the West was staged atSadler’s Wells Theatre, London, on 30 January1934, by Nikolay Sergeyev, on the basis of hisrégisseur’s notebooks brought with him fromSt. Petersburg, and this is the source fromwhich the ballet’s popularity has proliferated inthe years since 1945.

The Sleeping Beauty was likewise brought tothe West via Sergeyev’s notebooks, whichenabled the staging of the lavish productionstaged by Sergei Diaghilev and his Ballets russesat London’s Alhambra Theatre in 1921. Itprompted Igor Stravinsky to proclaim the musicof this ballet to be ‘the most convincingexample of Tchaikovsky’s great creative power’,but the production put Diaghilev so heavily intodebt that it had to be taken off. From it hemanaged to keep in repertory some of thedances, mostly from the last act, which werethen performed under the title Aurora’sWedding, as they are here.

Derived from one of the French fairy tales byCharles Perrault published in 1697, TheSleeping Beauty tempted Tchaikovsky back to

ballet for the first time after Swan Lake atMoscow more than a decade earlier.Vsevolozhsky at St. Petersburg made sure thatthe composer and Marius Petipa collaboratedclosely from the start, and the result eventuallybecame the most famous of the ballets à grandspectacle with which the Russian Imperial Balletraised the art to a new level of splendour andstyle, with music which in this case set newstandards for dance at the time.

In the sequence of music played here, theIntroduction to the ballet as a whole containsthe angry theme of Carabosse, the wickedFairy, overcome by the graceful tune of thebenign Lilac Fairy. Then comes the joyfulPolacca bringing various guests from Perrault’sfairy tales to Aurora’s wedding, after which areheard the six short solo dances for the Fairieswho bestowed their virtues on her at herchristening in the Prologue, and four numbersfrom the hunting scene in Act II where PrinceDesiré first encounters a vision of Aurora.

The following Pas de quatre is for four ‘JewelFairies’ at the wedding, and the Pas decaractère is danced by a skittish Red RidingHood pursued and caught by a growling wolf.The next Pas de quatre was choreographedfrom the outset as a Pas de deux for PrincessFlorine and a virtuoso Bluebird, and a formal

Entrée leading to an Adagio with an expressiveoboe theme is the wedding duet unitingAurora and the Prince. All then join in avigorous mazurka, leading to the tune of an oldFrench song, ‘Vive Henri quatre’, whichachieves the unusual effect of a ‘Happy-ever-after’ ending in a minor key.

Noël Goodwin

THE NUTCRACKERA Synopsis

OvertureTchaikovsky sets the scene he wants by makingthis, musically as well as in his description, aminiature overture: we are entering a world ofchildhood.

Act One, Scene 1No. 1: SceneThe Christmas TreeThe parents of Clara and Fritz, PresidentSilberhaus of the Town Council and his wife,are decorating their Christmas tree. Nineo’clock strikes. The children burst in with somefriends. The music is generally tender andgraceful, with only some woodwind banter toevoke the more awkward emotions of theoriginal Hoffmann story. With the arrival of thechildren, Tchaikovsky writes some of his mostcheerfully extrovert music.

No. 2: MarchAs they all join in a lively march round theroom, Tchaikovsky continues in his ‘miniature’vein. An original idea for a series ofmasquerade dances from various lands wasdropped (advisedly: it is early in the plot for a divertissement).

No. 3: Children’s galop and entrance of

the parentsEveryone joins in a galop; other children’sparents enter, and a general dance follows. Thefirst section is a light galop for the children; aformal minuet follows (Tchaikovsky was alwayshappy under the inspiration of French music);and the third section introduces a French tune,‘Bon voyage, cher Dumollet’.

No. 4: SceneDrosselmeyer’s arrival and distribution ofpresentsEnter Drosselmeyer. The children are a littlealarmed at his odd appearance, but recoverwhen they see that he has brought them toys– dolls, soldiers, also a large pie. Petipa wantedDrosselmeyer’s music to be ‘serious, somewhatfrightening, then comic’: Tchaikovsky obligeswith a quaint, awkward viola melody. Theatmosphere lightens and there follows ageneral waltz, then a lively presto.

No. 5: SceneThe Nutcracker and Grandfather danceClara and Fritz want to take the toys away butwhen they are not allowed to, Clara bursts intotears and Fritz throws a tantrum. Drosselmeyernow produces a huge toy Nutcracker. Clara isenchanted, but Fritz manages to break it; sadly,Clara cradles the Nutcracker in her arms, andsings it a lullaby. Drosselmeyer’s gift is

accompanied by a waltz, which turns into agraceful tune that includes a rattle in theorchestration (for the cracking of the nuts). Themusic speeds up dangerously, until theNutcracker breaks; it is here, and with thedescriptions of the boy’s and Clara’s reactions,that Tchaikovsky’s symphonic gifts are at theirmost effective. The scene ends with the so-called ‘Grossvatertanz’.

No. 6: SceneDeparture of the guests – nightThe children go to bed; but when Clara returnsto see her Nutcracker, strange things begin tohappen: an owl clock assumes Drosselmeyer’sface, and mice crawl out of the wainscot.Midnight strikes: the Christmas tree grows hugely.

No. 7: SceneThe battleA battle develops between the mice and thetoy soldiers: the mice win, and start eatingsome gingerbread soldiers. But the Nutcrackersummons his Guards, and in the renewedbattle Clara kills the Mouse King by throwingher slipper at him. The Nutcracker is releasedfrom his spell, and becomes a handsomePrince; he invites Clara on a journey to hisKingdom. In both these scenes, Tchaikovsky

continues to develop previously-heard themes,as well as introducing new ones, to underlinethe course of the action.

Act I, Scene 2No. 8: SceneA pine forest in winterThe room is transformed into a pine forest,with gnomes honouring the Prince and Clara.Snow falls as the two are guided on their way.The music now turns from a narrative aspect tosomething more openly emotional, as thetenderness between Clara and her Nutcrackerturns to something nearer love.

No. 9: Waltz of the snowflakesClara and the Prince are met by the King andQueen, who join them in a swirling waltz: thislater changes to a different rhythm, with anaccompaniment from a children’s choir.

Act IINo. 10: SceneThe enchanted palace of the Kingdom of SweetsIn Confiturenburg, the palace of the Kingdomof Sweets, the Sugar-Plum Fairy comes towelcome the travellers. She does so to harparpeggios and rippling celesta scales that mustindeed have surprised and delighted the firstaudiences.

No. 11: SceneArrival of Clara and the NutcrackerClara and the Prince are welcomed into theGreat Hall of the Palace; Clara is thanked forsaving the Prince’s life.

No. 12: DivertissementThis consists of a suite of dances, ending with‘Mother Cigogne and the clowns’. The use ofa character from French fairy-tales (The oldwoman who lived in a shoe) here once againsuggested to Tchaikovsky the use of Frenchtunes. The ones used here are ‘Giroflé, girola’and ‘Cadet rouselle’.

No. 13: Waltz of the flowers

No. 14: Pas de deuxThe Prince and the Sugar-Plum FairyThis is for the Sugar-Plum Fairy and PrinceOrgeat; it includes two variations and avigorous coda.

No. 15: Final waltz and apotheosisThe entire court joins in a final tribute to Clara.

John Warrack

Recording producer: Michael WoolcockRecording engineer: Stanley GoodallTape editor: Sally DrewRecording location: St Eustache, Montréal,Canada, May & October 1992Eloquence series manager: Cyrus Meher-HomjiArt direction: Chilu · www.chilu.comBooklet editor: Bruce Raggatt

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