Notes for: July 22, 2014
Over a composing career of 85 years, Saint-Saëns wrote vast quantities of attractive character pieces for many different instruments. His object was to discover and exploit the distinctive character of the instruments, finding new ways both to distinguish and to blend them. This evening we hear two examples – one written when he was 36 years old and in the full bloom of his career as a composer, concert pianist and church organist, and the other when he was 22 and still establishing his reputation in Paris.
Saint-Saëns wrote the Tarantelle, also originally with orchestral accompaniment, in 1857 when he was just embarking on his long and successful career as a composer, teacher, organist and pianist. The piece not only was instrumental in establishing his reputation, but also served through a humorous incident to win the influential support of Rossini, the leading opera composer of the day, then living in retirement in Paris.
According to Saint-Saëns’s memoirs, Rossini knew the flutist and clarinetist for which the piece was composed, and he suggested that they play it at one of the lavish dinner parties that he frequently gave for his army of admirers. Saint-Saëns continues:
As there was never any printed program at these celebrated evenings, Rossini contrived to give the impression that it was his own work. You can imagine what a tremendous success it had under such conditions. When the encore was finished, Rossini took me into the dining room and made me sit near him, holding me by the hand so that I couldn’t get away.
Then came the procession of admirers and camp followers. “Ah! Maestro! What a masterpiece!” and so on. And when the victim had exhausted all the superlatives he could think of, Rossini would blandly reply: “I entirely agree with you. But I didn’t write it – this gentleman here is the composer.”
“Tarantelle” is French for “tarantella,” a fast, often breathless, Italian dance in 6/8 time. According to popular legend, the dance is related to the tarantula spider and originated as a frenzied reaction to, or as a primitive cure for, the spider’s bite. The truth is that (1) the name of the dance derives from Taranto, a city in Italy, and that (2) tarantula bites are painful but not particularly toxic or maddening.