Gabel conducts Brahms

Fabien Gabel
Conductor

Fabien Gabel has established an international career of the highest calibre, appearing with orchestras such as London Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris, NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester, Gürzenich-Orchester Köln Cologne, Tonkünstler-Orchester, Oslo Philharmonic, Helsinki Philharmonic, The Cleveland Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Seoul Philharmonic and Melbourne Symphony Orchestra.

Having attracted international attention in 2004 as the winner of the Donatella Flick conducting competition, Fabien Gabel was Assistant Conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra from 2004- 2006. He was music director of Orchestre Symphonique de Québec from 2012-2021 and Orchestre Francais de Jeunes from 2017-2021.

Praised for his dynamic style and sensitive approach to the score, he is best known for his eclectic choice of repertoire ranging from core symphonic works to new music to championing lesser-known composers of the 19th and the 20th century.

Image credit: Maison Simons

Camille Pépin
(b.1990)

Laniakea

English translation of the program notes published in the full score:

When I was asked to write an overture for the "Roulement de timbales" series, I immediately had in mind something vast and powerful. I then thought of the recent discovery of Laniakea, this supercluster of galaxies counting among greatest structures of the Universe. Discovered in 2014 by Hélène Courtois, Laniakea means "immeasurable celestial paradise" in Hawaiian. Inside this supercluster, the galaxies are in motion and converge towards a single point called the Great Attractor. You have to imagine currents of galaxies where all the matter is pouring into the same place - like in the heart of a valley - at a crazy speed of 630 km/s.

Immensity, movement, speed, light... were the words that guided me in composing. This scenario of such a vast celestial horizon is a source of inspiration teeming with colours for my imagination as an orchestrator! So, I wanted to find musical resonances in this fascinating world of the infinitely large.

Like Haydn's Symphony No.103, Laniakea opens with a roll of timpani. He will return during the play under different forms: sometimes "naked", sometimes in the background or even in relay with the bass drum.

Laniakea is presented as a cosmic fresco articulated in three episodes preceded by an introduction and completed by a coda.

Powerful and majestic, the introduction presents a theme in brass and bells on a roll of timpani. The strings constitute a resonant and vibrating “wall of sound”. The material changes gradually. The woods melt into the strings and become liquid. The brass theme unfolding on this shimmering texture becomes softer and softer, eventually dissolving and let the light shine.

The first large part begins with a motif of oboe, glockenspiel and harmonics of high strings: so many luminous particles trying to break through this immense sky. The vibraphone and the woodwinds create a reverberating pad and help to give this passage a celestial and scintillating colour.

The texture becomes more rhythmic with the birth of a swirling and repetitive motif in the violas. In this hypnotic episode, the introductory theme is echoed in bells and horns. It intensifies. Matter spreads. Glockenspiel and harmonics - luminous keys - are suffused with stellar wind with the suspended cymbal roll. A more lyrical and bewitching theme appears on the cellos. It will be presented with different colours passing to the violins then to the violas. The appearance of the Eb-D glissando on the trombones is a signal: we move gradually into the second part. The rhythmic pattern dies out and the material becomes more and more nebulous.

- Camille Pépin

First performance:
16 May 2019, Echirolles (France). Leonard Slatkin, conductor.

Most recent WASO performance:
This is the Australian premiere.

Instrumentation:
two each of flutes, oboe, clarinets and three bassoons; four horns, two trumpets, three trombones and one tuba; timpani and two percussion, strings.

Johannes Brahms
(1833-1897)

Symphony No.3 in F, Op.90

Allegro con brio
Andante
Poco allegretto
Allegro

While the connection between Beethoven and Brahms has long been remarked, the influence of Goethe on Brahms has never been acknowledged fully. Like Brahms, Goethe was at heart a Classicist whose artistic vision was nevertheless broad enough to embrace, and indeed to be embraced by, the Romantic spirit of his age.

Perhaps because their art strived to reconcile these two conflicting impulses of passion and order, and perhaps because of the magnitude of the messages which they sought to convey, both Goethe and Brahms struggled for decades over their greatest masterpieces. In Brahms’ case, the breakthrough First Symphony took 15 years of painstaking effort. For Goethe, Faust emerged only after 60 years of intermittent rejection and revision. So perhaps it should be no surprise that when Brahms sought to convey his most personal thoughts through music, he turned to Goethe for his texts.

So too the middle movements of the Third Symphony emerged (according to Max Kalbeck) from incidental music which Brahms had sketched (but apparently never used) for a production of Goethe’s Faust. While no obvious traces of this appear in the Third Symphony, the dramatic power and universalist vision embodied within it suggest that no ordinary motivations were behind its composition.

Brahms began formal work on the Third Symphony during 1882 and completed it in Wiesbaden in 1883, when he was 50 years old. He had moved to Wiesbaden primarily to be near the contralto Hermine Spies, and it seems that she was the latest in a longish line of female idols whom Brahms wished to marry but didn’t dare ask.

Brahms’ unrequited love for Hermine was exacerbated by other personal crises at this time – not least the recent death of his revered teacher Eduard Marxsen and a temporary estrangement from Joseph Joachim. Small wonder then that the sunny disposition of the Second Symphony gave way now to more mixed emotions.

The symphony’s first performance was given by the Vienna Philharmonic under Hans Richter in December 1883, and was well received on first hearing. It has never really fallen out of favour, owing to its mastery of construction, its persuasive blend of lyricism and drama, and its exceptional orchestration. Apparently during the first rehearsals Brahms made many minor adjustments to the instrumental arrangements, subtly altering the orchestral colouring. And the resulting work, with its extraordinary clarity of instrumental effects and chamber music textures, demonstrates that Brahms was a much underrated orchestrator.

He was even better at providing spectacular openings for his symphonies, and the Third is no exception. It begins with three dramatic chords which immediately give way to the passionate main theme in the strings. As in so much of Brahms’ greatest music, the first 30 seconds have penetrated directly into the heart of the musical matter and the sound-world of the entire symphony has largely been established. After the graceful secondary theme appears in the clarinet, the development is followed by the return of the opening motif in the horns, leading to an unusually diverse recapitulation and a coda which brings a more tranquil restatement of the opening material.

The slow movement contains one of Brahms’ most famous melodies which is introduced by the clarinet and then imitated by the violas and other sections of the orchestra. It is music which is so evocative that it lends itself to a variety of conflicting interpretations – it is chorale-like but also pastoral, its grace is Mozartian but its reflectiveness is typically Brahmsian, it is almost naive in sentiment but extraordinarily sophisticated in execution, and its musical material is basically diatonic but with interjections of wrong-key ‘foreign’ chords.

The third movement serves as a kind of melancholy minuet and trio. The minuet opens in the cellos and, after a brief trio section, it returns with the horn leading the way.

As in his other symphonies, Brahms throws the weight back on in the finale. It begins sotto voce and with a sense of suppressed agitation but soon boils over, the blaring brass and woodwind working up to a climax during the development. In the recapitulation the tempo slows and at last, in pianissimo whispers in the strings, the very first theme of the symphony returns, and consolation takes over from conflict as this most unified and beautifully proportioned of symphonies ushers in its sublime conclusion. Had he lived to hear it, Goethe may well have been impressed.

Adapted from a note by Martin Buzacott
Symphony Australia © 1997

First performance:
2 December 1883, Vienna. Hans Richter conducting.

Most recent WASO performance:
28 August 2015. Asher Fisch, conductor.

Instrumentation:
two each of flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons and contrabassoon; four horns, two trumpets, three trombones; timpani and strings.

Peter Miller
Trumpet

Tell us about your journey to WASO.

I grew up in Canberra where I graduated from the ANU School of Music in 1999. Following 3 years living and working in the USA, where I obtained a Master of Music degree at Cleveland Institute of Music (studying under Michael Sachs of the famed Cleveland Orchestra) I returned to Australia where I spent a further 3 years freelancing with various orchestras and teaching in Sydney. I joined WASO in 2006…and 16 years later…here I am with a beautiful wife, two gorgeous girls and a new Labrador puppy (called Moose).

Which famous musicians do you admire and why?

As far as trumpeters go there are too many to name but certainly Wynton Marsalis, Håkan Hardenberger and Australia’s own multi-instrumentalist freak show James Morrison would all have to be up there. As far as other instrumentalists, people who are currently taking up far too much of my time (watching them on YouTube) are the likes of Jacob Collier and Stevie Wonder for their incredible harmonic and groove talents and Bobby McFerrin (Don’t Worry Be Happy!) for his incredible gift of inspiring so many with his passion for music and life.

If you could choose any favourite holiday destination where would it be?

Having just returned from three days on Rottnest Island with my family, I can think of few better places to relax, unwind and recharge the batteries. We in Perth are truly blessed to have such a beautiful place sitting right on our doorstep. From having a white sandy beach all to yourself, to snorkeling in the crystal-clear water, riding around the island, to the ‘joy’ of scraping quokka poo off your shoes…it’s a place like no other!

Tell us about one of your passions outside of music?

Apart from enjoying long romantic walks on the beach, one of my passions outside of music is spending time in my ever-developing garden. Combing natives, fruit trees, veggies, chooks and even aquaponics, the time I spend in the garden is like therapy for me as it is both rewarding and relaxing (not to mention the health benefits!)

What is your favourite style of music to play?

As the trumpet is such a versatile instrument, it is difficult to narrow it down to one particular style I like to play the most. Growing up, I always enjoyed playing music from the Baroque period on the piccolo trumpet. This included composers such as Bach, Handel and Telemann. This period was known as the “Golden Age” of the trumpet offering beautiful, high obligato lines that always create demands on the player but thrilling results! Within the orchestra, the music of the Romantic greats such as Mahler, Brahms, Bruckner, Tchaikovsky and Wagner would be my favourite to play however as a trumpeter you can never go past the film scores of John Williams!

Outside of WASO, what kinds of music do you listen to?

I do not tend to listen to that much music outside of WASO, however, with two girls aged 9 and 7, I have become quite the aficionado on the music of Katy Perry, Ed Sheeran and Galantis lately.