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SUMMER MUSIC. Listen to the wind. It talks... No.17/31.07
- victorshramko
- Jul 31
- 4 min read
We are already in the middle of the summer. That's why on our blog there's something about travels: Spanish flamenco or Operatic Festivals. But I'm stuck at home in the mountains, because although I love people, I don't want to meet them all in one place at once. However, I'd write something about summer music.
Midsummer Barber!
Vivaldi – Four Seasons: Summer. Mendelssohn – A Midsummer Night's Dream. This is Shakespeare! But... I was just coming back from my barber... Yes, Barber, not The Barber of Seville. The one of America. Samuel Barber (1910-1981), composer of lovely Summer Music for 5 'winds' (flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon & horn).
He is one of the most popular American composers. At the age of 6, he began systematically learning music. Few composers can have begun with more advantages than Barber. Born to a prosperous and musical family. His father was a physician, but his mother was a pianist, his aunt was the famous contralto at the MET Opera, and his uncle was an American art song composer. At the age of 7, Samuel composed his first song 'Sadness'. Perhaps as a complaint about family pressure. Because his family, despite his musical talents, wanted him to become a typical athletic American boy. In particular – a football player. But he did not!
At the age of 9, he determinedly wrote a letter to his mother
Dear Mother, I have written this to tell you my worrying secret. Now don't cry when you read it because it is neither your nor my fault. I suppose I will have to tell you it now without any nonsense. To begin with, I was not meant to be an athlete. I was meant to be a composer, and will be I'm sure. I'll ask one more thing. - Don't ask me to try to forget this unpleasant thing and go to play football. - Please – Sometimes I've been worrying about this so much that it makes me mad (not very).
And Samuel stood his ground. Got his own way. Precociously gifted as a pianist, cellist, and singer, he entered the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia at the age of 14. His graduation piece was the brilliant overture The School for Scandal and Dover Beach for baritone and string quartet (he sang himself! Beautiful voice – mentioned critics). The promise was fulfilled soon in The 1st Symphony and his eternal hit - Adagio for Strings (presented under the baton of the legendary Arturo Toscanini).
Europeaness, the war, world fame
Showered with famous awards (among others Rome Prize, Bearns, Pulitzer and so on), he could afford to continue his studies in Europe. He loved it. His favorites were Vienna, Rome & Paris. He was the first American to present his Symphony at the Salzburg Festival. After the US entered World War II, Barber joined the Army Air Corps. While serving, he continued composing. He began with The Commando March for Band and culminated with the Air Force Symphony premiered in Boston under Serge Koussevitzky.
After the WWII, he was a baritone soloist on NBC Radio for a couple of years. As he achieved international success as a composer, he became also a renowned conductor of his own works. He composed the ballet Medea for Martha Graham and the opera Vanessa with a libretto by his closest lifelong friend, the composer (not writer!) Carlo Menotti. After its premiere at the MET, the opera won the Pulitzer Prize and was also the first American opera presented at the Salzburg Festival. Further successes brought him piano works: Sonata (for Vladimir Horowitz) and Piano Concerto for the inauguration of NY Lincoln Center. The most distinguished orchestras and soloists sought his new compositions. Barber became famous all over the world, but...
Great men's favors are uncertain
It is also said that: Lord's grace rides on a colorful horse. Such great success did not change his mind. He was very demanding of himself. Once in front of his constant publisher (G. Schirmer) he tore up the score of his symphony, which he was becoming dissatisfied with. (Fortunately, it was possible to recreate it from the orchestral voices.)
This is probably why he suffered a long mental breakdown after the disastrous failure of the premiere of his third opera Antony & Cleopatra in 1966 at the MET. He didn't forgive himself and spent a decade trying to correct the work.
Maybe he liked summer?
Summer Music commissioned by the Chamber Music Society in Detroit was premiered in 1956 and received very warmly by the audience. It is Barber's only such work and has become a staple of the wind-quintet repertory.
Before that, in 1948 Barber had composed another composition on the theme of summer: Knoxville: Summer 1915 for soprano & orchestra. It also brought him success. Maybe he liked summer?
Find romance?
When Romanticism reigned supreme in classical music, modern America and its culture were just taking shape. Barber's music is like a bridge between European neo-romanticism and modern, already American music of the 20th century (up to jazz). However, always very expressive, somehow – Romantic.
'They say I don't have my own style, but it doesn't matter. I just do my own thing, so to speak. I think that takes a certain courage. - he wrote at the end of his life.
After the time of Barber's death from cancer in 1981, The New York Times wrote: 'Probably no other American composer has ever enjoyed such early, such persistent and such long-lasting acclaim.'
Native American poetical sentence says:
Listen to the wind. It talks.
Listen to the silence. It speaks.
Listen to the heart. It knows....
Enough words.
Let us play: Samuel Barber: Summer Music for Wind Quintet Op.31 (1956)
Written by
Cezary Owerkowicz
Co-founder of Kuwait Music Academy and
Director of Treasure of Talents Festival in Kuwait
