Empire of Genius - With the Las Vegas Philharmonic; Read Jetsetters Magazine www.jetsettersmagazine.com

Vienna seems to have had a strong gravitational pull on composers from all over Europe. The seat of the mighty Hapsburg Empire attracted, among others, Mozart from his hometown of Salzburg, Beethoven from Bonn, and Brahms from Hamburg. These historic composers would be featured in this season’s second performance by the Las Vegas Philharmonic, “Memoirs from Vienna ".

Ludwig von Beethoven

Writers in general, and geniuses in particular (trust me, I know) must resist the temptation to revise their work endlessly, or the compositions will never achieve final form. Ludwig von Beethoven (1770-1827) was no exception: his “Leonore Overture No. 3” is so named because it is one of four alternate overtures he wrote for his opera Fidelio, the story of the prisoner Florestan and his faithful wife Leonore. The third overture was introduced with a major revision of the opera in Vienna in 1806 and was so compelling that Beethoven later replaced it with one that wouldn’t “steal the show” from the opera. Overture No. 3, really more of a symphonic poem, became a popular concert piece in its own right. It seems to describe the full sequence of the opera’s moods: fear, despondency, hope, and finally triumph. The smooth transition from one emotional extreme to another is perhaps the greatest display of Beethoven’s genius.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) had a keen sense of public musical tastes, and he composed his Sinfonia Concertante, K. 297b for a patron in Paris, where this type of work was quite fashionable in 1778. A sinfonia concertante is a concerto written for multiple soloists, and this one features delightful interplay and overlap among the clarinet, oboe, French horn, and bassoon. The first two often play in tandem, being similar in pitch, while the latter two play countermelodies in lower tones. Whether in the quick first movement (Allegro), the serene second (Adagio), or the even quicker third (Allegro con Variazioni), the feeling is the same — “all Europe in a good mood,” as one self-proclaimed genius described Mozart’s work.

Not that everything was rosy: a personality conflict between Mozart and the influential Parisian composer Giuseppe Maria Cambini caused the commissioner of Mozart’s work to cancel its introductory performance and to eject the young upstart from the city! As music scholar, Daniel N. Leeson writes, “Mozart had tried to win a contest of influence and he was outgunned by a musical nonentity.” Undaunted, Mozart returned to Austria and rewrote the piece from memory. Which composer is remembered by history? Mozart, one; what’s-his-name, zero.

Actually, this particular work has suffered in modern popularity due to doubts about its authenticity stemming from the loss of Mozart’s original manuscript. After the death of musician Otto Jahn in 1869, a score of Mozart’s sinfonia was discovered in his estate, adapted (apparently by Jahn himself) for the four soloists plus orchestra. If in fact Jahn or some other composer created the sinfonia itself, the guy is a better impersonator than anyone in Vegas.

	Johannes Brahms

Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) may have lacked Mozart’s instinct for public tastes in writing his Symphony No. 4 in E Minor, Op. 98, in 1885. The work received lukewarm responses from audiences and harsh criticism from experts and friends. The first three movements are stirring and emotional, with dramatic layering of string melodies from the highs of the violins to the lows of the basses. Brahms composed the fourth movement as a passacaglia, or variations on a theme. Some friends thought the final movement didn’t fit well and should be dropped, but Brahms stuck to his guns. Geniuses tend, after all, to be stubborn.

Through the years, especially given Brahms’ overall popularity, his final symphony grew more appreciated by critics and audiences alike. In 1897, when the visibly ailing composer attended the Vienna Philharmonic’s performance of his Symphony No. 4, wild applause interrupted the orchestra after every movement. (I thought that happened only in Las Vegas !) The audience reportedly realized they were likely seeing Brahms for the last time. He died less than a month later. Had the Viennese known that the centuries-old Hapsburg dynasty was also approaching its end, they might have cried, too.

Thus endeth the history lesson. The Las Vegas Philharmonic will perform its annual Holiday Concert on December 11 and 12 and continue its Classical Series on February 26, 2005. Get your tickets before this year’s concert season is also just a memory.

— Feature by Robert LaGrone, Las Vegas Jetsetters Magazine Correspondent.