Santa Barbara Music Club

Apotheosis

Saturday, October 19, 2019 3:00 pm

First United Methodist Church

305 E Anapamu Street, Santa Barbara, CA 93101

Image: Johannes Brahms

This afternoon, pianist Betty Oberacker and clarinetist David Singer perform the program “Apotheosis,” a grouping of works that represent the summation of a practice or of a composer’s musical style. The roster features Oberacker’s performance of two preludes and fugues from J.S. Bach’s The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book II: C major, BWV 870, and in F-sharp minor, BWV 882. She concludes the Bach portion of the program with the sparkling Italian Concerto, BWV 971. Singer then joins to conclude the program with the Sonata in F Minor, Op. 120/1, for clarinet and piano by Johannes Brahms.

Program Details

The Well-Tempered Clavier, Bk. II
Johann Sebastian Bach
(1685-1750)
  • Prelude and Fugue in C major, BWV 870
  • Prelude and Fugue in F minor, BWV 881
  • Prelude and Fugue in F-sharp minor, BWV 883
Italian Concerto, BWV 971
Johann Sebastian Bach
  • [Allegro]
  • [Andante]
  • [Presto]
Betty Oberacker, piano
Sonata in F minor, Op.120, No. 1
Johannes Brahms
(1833-1897)
  • Allegro appassionata
  • Andante un poco adagio
  • Allegretto grazioso
  • Vivace
David Singer, clarinet
Betty Oberacker, piano

Notes on the Program

The word ‘apotheosis’ has become clichéd, at least in musical discussion, lying just below the most overused words, like ‘genius.’ We tend to ascribe these words to beloved composers, with the works of Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) providing strong examples, as he is generally regard as the apotheosis of the Baroque period. That is quite a broad claim, yet we can glean some truth to this sweeping statement by examining specific works or even characteristics of works against a specialized backdrop.

Take, for example, tonality, which, with its 12 major and 12 minor keys, became the default harmonic practice of Western music between 1600 and 1900. By the 1720s, tonality had been developing for well over a century but barely received systematic, practical grounding in a collection of musical compositions. That all changed when Bach published The Well Tempered Clavier, and, for this reason, the work stands as an apotheosis of Western tonality.

Bach composed 48 preludes and fugues, two in each major and minor key, and spanning two publications: Book I in 1722 and Book II in 1744, with the latter having been influenced by recent improvements in the piano suggested by Bach to his friend, the keyboard instrument builder Gottfried Silbermann. Bach capitalized on the differences each key suggested with regard to character, mood, tuning, and affect. By doing so, Bach codified tonality. This afternoon, Betty Oberacker pairs the most polarizing tonalities of the 24 possible keys, the Preludes and Fugues in C major, BWV 870, and F-sharp minor, BWV 882 from Book II of The Well Tempered Clavier. In music theory, the octave divides into 12 semi-tones. In relation to the pitch C, F# bisects evenly into six semi-tones (the tritone). Therefore, the pitch centers of C and F# lie as far away as one can get in tonality.

While Bach scored the Italian Concerto in F Major, BWV 971, for solo keyboard, the work illustrates his absolute mastery of its form and organization. In addition, it is one of the few works for keyboard that Bach designates for two-manual use (traditionally on the harpsichord). Thus the performer could simulate the concerto style of traversed dynamics – many players vs. few players, tutti vs. concertino, or loud keyboard vs. soft keyboard. Betty Oberacker’s performance on the piano this afternoon substitutes the manual changes of the harpsichord with the dynamic shadings of the piano.

For some, the life of Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) coincided with the rise and fall of so-called High Romanticism in Germany. The clarinet, ironically, never figured largely into his composing. Yet his final two chamber works, sonatas for clarinet and piano, stand not only as masterworks but also as the first of their kind in the genre, and in this sense, the sonatas function as both signpost and summation. On the one hand, they are premier works upon which later composers might build; on the other hand, the pieces came from the pen of a composer who has mastered his craft and has reached the end of his life.

The circumstances surrounding the composition of the Brahms Sonata for Clarinet and Piano in F Minor, Op. 120, No. 1, its companion piece, the Sonata No. 2 in E-flat major, Op. 120, No. 2, and two other major masterworks highlighting the clarinet, are of quite some interest:

In 1891, Brahms had decided to retire from composing altogether. However, after hearing the clarinet music of Mozart and Weber, and after hearing the clarinetist Richard Mühlfeld perform (Brahms was reported by his friends to say that he was “stunned” after hearing Mühlfeld play), he decided to explore the instrument’s potential, resulting in a flurry of phenomenally beautiful chamber pieces for the instrument: the Clarinet Trio in A minor, Op. 114, the Clarinet Quintet in B minor, Op. 115, and the two Sonatas for Clarinet and Piano, Op. 120. Brahms obviously regarded the clarinet as a fitting instrument for the expression of his ideas during his twilight years, as it can sound both opulent and brooding. Betty Oberacker and David Singer close this afternoon’s performance with a work that captures both aspects, as the opening broods with a poignant melancholy – yet finishes with a virtuosity replete with optimistic opulence.

The Performers

David Singer, clarinetist, enjoys a career as one of the most highly respected clarinetist in the United States. The New York Times proclaimed, “To describe Singer’s playing would be to enumerate a catalogue of virtues.” Principal clarinetist, Emeritus, of the Grammy Award-winning Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, his performances include the White House for Presidents Carter and Clinton, guest artist with the Lincoln Center Chamber Music Society, and chamber music concerts with Yehudi Menuhin, Yo Yo Ma, Rudolf Serkin, and members of the Guarneri and Emerson String Quartets. Gramophone Magazine affirmed, ”His playing is exceptional … sensitive and expressive, technically brilliant.” “Singer’s Copland performance is one of the finest accounts around.” Of his West Coast premiere of the Aldridge Concerto with the L.A. Chamber Orchestra, the Los Angeles Times noted, “… teeming with energy, rowdy, ethnic and fun.” The Max Reger Institute in Karlsruhe, Germany selected Singer’s recording with Rudolf Serkin of Reger’s Clarinet Sonata Op. 107 to be reissued internationally in 2023, celebrating the 150th anniversary of the composer’s birth.

Betty Oberacker, pianist, is internationally acclaimed for her interpretations of both traditional and contemporary solo and chamber music repertoire, and has toured throughout Europe, Israel, Asia, Australia, New Zealand, Mexico and the U.S., including performances at Carnegie Hall, Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Berlin Philharmonic Hall and Vienna Musikverein. She has been Artist-in-Residence at 55 universities, conservatories and music festivals worldwide, and many important composers have dedicated their compositions to her. Her musical gifts were evidenced at three, when she began to play the piano and compose entirely by ear. Piano lessons started at age seven, and at nine she was accepted on scholarship as the only child student of the noted pianist Beryl Rubinstein. Her BM/MM Degrees are from the Cleveland Institute of Music, and her DMA Degree is from Ohio State University, where she was concomitantly a member of the piano faculty. Her discography includes Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier (Clavier Records), A Bach Commemorative Recital (MIT Great Performances Archives), Chamber Music of Emma Lou Diemer (Orion), Schönberg’s Pierrot Lunaire (Century), John Biggs’ Variations on a Theme of Shostakovich (VMM), and Diemer’s Piano Concerto (MMC), the latter two works composed for Oberacker. Honors accorded her include a Fulbright Research Fellowship to Italy and the University of California Distinguished Teaching Award, and her students hold important positions as performers and teachers in the U.S., Asia and Europe. Dr. Oberacker is UCSB Professor Emeritus, and enjoys an active performing, teaching and chamber music coaching schedule.


Funding support for our 50th Anniversary Season is provided by the City of Santa Barbara's Organizational Development Grant Program and by the Towbes Fund for the Performing Arts, a field of interest fund of the Santa Barbara Foundation.