The first in D major has a vigorous introduction after which unison strings come forth with a robust march tune. The opening introduction is subsequently used as a transition to the trio in which a soaring melody is set against a uniform rhythmic beat.
The fourth in G major, known as “Song of Liberty,” is also familiar. Once again the opening consists of spirited march music, and once again the heart of the composition is a broad and stately melody for the strings. This melody receives extended treatment which culminates with a rousing statement by the full orchestra.
Salut d’amour, for chamber orchestra, op. 12 (1889) is a nostalgic and sentimental piece of music in three-part song form that has become a salon favorite. It is also famous in a transcription for violin and piano.
Duke Ellington
Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington was born in Washington, D.C. on April 29, 1899. His career as a popular musician began in his adolescence when he performed jazz pieces on the piano in an ice-cream parlor in Washington, and after that formed his own jazz group. In 1923 he came to New York where he soon thereafter formed a jazz band which performed at the Kentucky Club in Harlem. Discovered by Irving Mills, the publisher, Ellington was booked for the Cotton Club where he remained several years and established his fame as an outstanding exponent of real jazz—as pianist, conductor of his orchestra, composer, and arranger. He has since joined the all-time greats of jazz music, acclaimed in night clubs, on the Broadway stage and Hollywood screen, over the radio, on records, and in triumphant tours throughout the music world.
As a composer Ellington is famous for his popular songs (“Mood Indigo,” “Sophisticated Lady” and so forth) and short instrumental jazz pieces (Black and Tan Fantasy, Creole Rhapsody, East St. Louis Toodle-oo, etc.) All this falls within the province of either popular music or jazz, and for this reason cannot be considered here.
Ellington has also produced a rich repertory of larger works for orchestra which have a place in the permanent library of semi-classical music in the same way that Gershwin’s larger works do. Skilfully utilizing the fullest resources of jazz techniques, styles, and idioms, Ellington has created in these larger works an authentically American music. He himself prefers to consider many of these works as “Negro music” rather than jazz; nevertheless, in their blues harmonies, jazz colorations, and melodic and rhythmic techniques these works represented jazz music at its very best.
Perhaps the most distinguished of these symphonic-jazz works is Black, Brown and Beige, an extended work which Ellington introduced with his orchestra in Carnegie Hall, New York, in 1943, and which he described as a “tonal parallel of the Negro in America.” The first movement, “Black,” is a musical picture of the Negro at work, singing at his labors on the docks and levees in the slavery period before the Civil War. An alto saxophone solo brings on a plangent Spiritual, “Come Sunday.” The second movement, “Brown,” represents the wars in which Negroes have participated. A tenor solo sings an eloquent blues of the unsettled condition of the Negro after the Civil War. The contemporary Negro is the inspiration for the finale, “Beige,” utilizing jazz idioms and styles in portraying the period of the Twenties, Thirties and Forties. Many facets of Negro life are drawn in brief musical episodes, including the Negro church and school, and the Negro’s aspiration towards sophistication. The work ends on a patriotic note, prophesying that the Negro’s place in the American way of life is secure.
Georges Enesco
Georges Enesco was born in Liveni, Rumania, on August 19, 1881. He studied the violin at the Conservatories of Vienna and Paris, winning highest honors in both places. Following the completion of his studies in 1899, he launched a successful career both as concert violinist and as composer. For several years he was the court violinist to the Queen of Rumania, besides making outstandingly successful appearances on the concert stage throughout Europe. His debut as composer took place in Paris before his sixteenth birthday, with a concert devoted entirely to his own works. Success came in 1901 with his Rumanian Rhapsody No. 1. Enesco also distinguished himself as a conductor. When he made his American debut—on January 2, 1923 with the Philadelphia Orchestra in New York City—it was in the triple role of violinist, conductor, and composer. After World War I, Enesco divided his residence between Paris and his native Rumania while touring the music world. He made his last American appearance in 1950 on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of his debut as violinist; once again he appeared in the triple role of violinist, conductor and composer. He suffered a stroke in Paris in July 1954 and died there on May 4, 1955. After his death, his native village, and a street in Bucharest, were named after him.