{"id":251,"date":"2016-09-14T18:51:56","date_gmt":"2016-09-14T18:51:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.runyanprogramnotes.com\/program_note\/symphony-c-major\/"},"modified":"2025-04-02T19:51:03","modified_gmt":"2025-04-02T19:51:03","slug":"symphony-c-major","status":"publish","type":"program_note","link":"https:\/\/www.runyanprogramnotes.com\/program_note\/symphony-c-major\/","title":{"rendered":"Symphony in C major"},"content":{"rendered":"

Georges Bizet was a genuine musical prodigy, whose talent was early and widely recognized, who studied with the best teachers and composers in France, who perhaps was the close equal of Liszt as a pianist, who won the Prix de Rome, <\/em>and who composed perhaps the most popular opera of all time.\u00a0 And yet.\u00a0 His career was a checkered one, full of missteps, works that were never finished, works that were finished and not performed, betrayals and failures with the French operatic establishment, and an early death at the age of thirty-six.\u00a0 He planned, started, or substantially worked on some thirty operas, but finished only about five, of which only two achieved success.\u00a0 His musical legacy was a story of lost manuscripts, poor or no scholarly attention, bad editions, and general neglect.\u00a0 Today, the American musical public knows his work almost entirely through his immortal opera Carmen, <\/em>and to a lesser degree, the opera The Pearl Fishers<\/em>, as well as his orchestral suites of incidental music from the play, L\u2019Arl\u00e9sienne.\u00a0 <\/em>The situation is only somewhat better in Europe–even in his native France.\u00a0\u00a0 While he did compose a substantial body of work, it was admittedly irregular in quality, and certainly in reception.\u00a0 Moreover, to survive financially, he was reduced to spending much of his musical life arranging the music of other composers.<\/p>\n

His first substantial work was the Symphony in C major, and there are few examples in all of musical history of such a complete, polished, and mature work from the pen of a seventeen year-old. \u00a0\u00a0At the time he had already been a student at the Paris Conservatoire for seven years, and was the star pupil of his mentor, Gounod.\u00a0\u00a0 It is clear that Bizet considered it a student work, and it was never published, performed, or even mentioned by Bizet in all of his correspondence, for the rest of his life. \u00a0\u00a0It lay undisturbed and unknown in the library of the Paris Conservatoire until 1933, when it was \u201cdiscovered\u201d by a French musicologist.\u00a0 It received its world premi\u00e8re shortly thereafter in Basel, Switzerland in 1935.\u00a0 Immediately garnering accolades, it swiftly entered the standard repertoire for orchestra.<\/p>\n

In the ensuing years close studies of the symphony clearly show that it derived much of its material, form, and procedures from the Symphony No. 1 in D major that his teacher, Gounod, was almost simultaneously completing.\u00a0\u00a0 And yet, the marvel is equally clear:\u00a0 Bizet\u2019s work is without doubt, the distinct superior to that of his model as in every way.\u00a0\u00a0 He simply took Gounod\u2019s work as a point of departure, borrowed what he needed, and\u2014as Bach once observed on such musical purloining\u2014\u201cpaid him back with substantial interest.\u201d<\/p>\n

Written just a few days after his seventeenth birthday in 1855, the Symphony in C was finished in only a few weeks.\u00a0 Cast in the familiar four movements of a classic-early romantic symphony, Bizet\u2019s work employs a modest standard instrumentation, without trombones, tuba, or percussion–except for timpani.\u00a0 It\u2019s clearly Mozartian, with all of the virtues of the earlier composer.\u00a0\u00a0 The first movement is effervescent in every way; the main theme is a spritely little three-note motive that enters right away, after the single opening chord.\u00a0 And, soon, in the best Mozart manner, the second theme, heard first in the oboe, is typically more lyrical and restrained.\u00a0 You\u2019ll know that the development has started when a few notes in the solo horn are heard.\u00a0 After a suitable, but not elaborate, working through of both themes, an arpeggio in the horn tells us the recap is at hand.\u00a0 Bizet doesn’t pull any surprises, here, but does a complete recapitulation and this little romp is over.<\/p>\n

After a soft, mysterious introduction with horn chords and octave leaps in the woodwinds, the winsome, melancholy main idea is heard in the oboe over staccato \u201cwalking\u201d strings.\u00a0 It is admittedly tempting\u2014and not without reason\u2014to hear presentiments of the \u201cSpanish\u201d style of the composer, from eighteen years later in Carmen.<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0 Bizet\u2019s vaunted mastery of harmonic color is heard from time to time in the beguiling modulations that carry the sensuous lyricism that pervades.\u00a0 Contrast is necessary from this delicious sound, so the young composer gives us an \u201cichy\u201d little fugue, beginning in the strings.\u00a0 Soon, the opening lyric oboe returns to wrap up this remarkable essay that belied the composer\u2019s youth.<\/p>\n

A cheerful, dancing scherzo is next, of course.\u00a0\u00a0 But, the interesting feature is the usual diversion of the middle section.\u00a0 Another feature of Bizet\u2019s maturity that some may recognize are the rustic \u201copen\u201d fifths in the low strings that accompany the woodwind activity above.\u00a0\u00a0 It\u2019s decidedly an allusion to peasant, or other \u201cexotic\u201d musical traditions that Bizet would employ with great facility, later on in his career.<\/p>\n

The last movement opens with a kind of perpetual motion activity in the strings.\u00a0 Wind fanfares announce the obligatory lyric second idea, and we\u2019re off to the races.\u00a0 The movement is a simple sonata form like the first, and after sizzling development, there\u2019s a gallop to the end that features all of the familiar material.\u00a0 Youthful works are usually, and appropriately, heard as just that–apprentice pieces that hint of greater things to come.\u00a0 Not so, here.\u00a0 Bizet hit the ground running at the callow age of seventeen, and, with a total absence of youthful pretentiousness, nevertheless gave us work of mastery, charm, and grace.<\/p>\n

–Wm. E. Runyan<\/p>\n

\u00a9 2016 William E. Runyan<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"program_note_tax":[50],"class_list":["post-251","program_note","type-program_note","status-publish","hentry","program_note_tax-georgesbizet"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.runyanprogramnotes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/program_note\/251","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.runyanprogramnotes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/program_note"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.runyanprogramnotes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/program_note"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.runyanprogramnotes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.runyanprogramnotes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=251"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"program_note_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.runyanprogramnotes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/program_note_tax?post=251"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}