Mozart's "Ch'io mi scordi di te" was written in 1787 for a farewell concert of
London-born soprano Anna Selina "Nancy" Storace, who had been residing in Vienna as part
of an Italian opera ensemble since 1773. The piece was written as a combination soprano
operatic aria and piano concerto for Mozart to perform at the concert. Storace, the original
Susanna in Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro in 1786, meant a great deal to Mozart. As Mozart
scholar Alfred Einstein notes, "Mozart poured into it his whole soul… We have the
impression that [he] wanted to preserve the memory of [Nancy’s] voice... not suited to a
display of virtuosity, but full of warmth and tenderness; and that he wanted to leave with her
in the piano part a souvenir of the taste and depth of his playing, and of the depth of his
feeling for her…”1
The text for the concert aria can also be found in an aria written as an addition
to a revival of Mozart's Idomeneo and is speculated to have been written by Mozart's frequent
librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte. Originally, the piece was orchestrated with strings, 2 clarinets, 2
bassoons, and 2 horns, as well as the piano obbligato and solo voice. Today it will be played
with voice and two pianos as arranged by Britta Epling.
1
Ch’io mi scordi di te?
Che a lei mi doni puoi consigliarmi?
E puoi che in vita?
Ah no. Sarebbe il viver mio di morte assai peggior!
Venga la morte! intrepido l’attendo.
Ma ch’io possa struggermi ad altra face,
Ad altr’oggetto donar gl’affetti miei, come tentarlo?
Ah! di dolor morrei!
You ask that I forget you?
You can advise that I give myself to her?
And this while yet I live?
Ah no. My life would be far worse than death!
Let death come - I await it fearlessly.
But how could I attempt to warm myself to another flame,
To lavish my affections on another?
Ah! I should die of grief!
Non temer, amato bene,
Per te sempre il cor sarà.
Più non reggo a tante pene,
L’alma mia mancando va.
Tu sospiri? O duol funesto!
Pensa almen, che istante è questo!
Non mi posso, oh Dio! spiegar.
Stelle barbare, stelle spietate,
Perchè mai tanto rigor?
Alme belle, che vedete
Le mie pene in tal momento,
Dite voi, s’egual tormento
Può soffrir un fido cor.
Fear nothing, my beloved,
My heart will always be yours.
I can no longer suffer such distress,
My spirit fails me.
You sigh? O mournful sorrow!
Just think what a moment this is!
O God! I cannot express myself.
Barbarous stars, pitiless stars,
Why are you so stern?
Fair souls who see my
Sufferings at such a moment,
Tell me if ever a faithful heart
Could feel such torment
"'Ch'io mi scordi di te?' K. 505," LA Philharmonic, http://www.laphil.com/philpedia/music/chio-mi-scordi-dite-k-505-wolfgang-amadeus-mozart, Accessed October 20, 2015.
Samuel Barber wrote Knoxville: Summer of 1915 in 1947 to poetic prose
by James Agee. Agee was born in Knoxville, Tennessee to a paternal family of farmers
and a maternal family of university graduates. The year 1915 is significant to the poet in
that it is when the then 6-year-old Agee lost his father in an auto accident. Following his
father's death, Agee was enrolled in a school where he was only allowed to visit his
mother once per week. Although he thrived in his literary education and skills at the
piano, he was often found staring longingly outside of his mother's house. He was
plagued by severe depression until his death on the 40th anniversary of his father's death.
Agee also died in a car, although his cause of death was a heart attack and not an accident
like his father.
The prose for Knoxville were first published in 1938, but were later
republished as the prelude to Agee's novel, A Death in the Family, which was published
after his death and which won him a posthumous Pulitzer Prize. The prose consists of
over 1700 words but only took the writer 90 minutes to write.2 Barber sets this nostalgic
text in a manner that evokes both the happy memories expressed and the sadness at their
passing. The original composition was for voice and orchestra but will be performed
today by a mixed chamber ensemble arranged by Richard Kimball and copied by Arturo
Hernandez.
***
Despite the fact that Leonard Bernstein is probably best known for his
tragic musical West Side Story, a 20th-century adaptation of Shakespeare's Romeo and
Juliet, he has a smattering of art songs which are much more light-hearted in nature.
Among these lighter works is the comedic La Bonne Cuisine. The collection of songs is a
setting of four recipes found in the Victorian-aged cookbook La Bonne Cuisine Francaise
by Émile Dumont. Bernstein set the original French language and also made an English
rendition of his own which highlights some of the more comedic aspects of the original
text. Both texts are found below. He wrote the work for mezzo-soprano Jennie Tourel, as
he did many of his pieces, noting that she is "The only begetter of these songs."3 The set
was originally written for voice and piano in 1949 and has been arranged this year for
voice and four winds by the recitalist.
2
David Paul Kirkpatrick, "Jame's Agee's Masterwork: Knoxville: Summer of 1915 - Written in Ninety
Minutes," David Paul Kirkpatrick's Living in the Metaverse; June 30, 2012,
http://www.davidpaulkirkpatrick.com/2012/06/30/james-agees-masterwork-knoxville-summer-of-1915written-in-ninety-minutes/, Accessed October 21, 2015.
3
Leonard Bernstein, La Bonne Cuisine, London; Boosey & Hawkes, 1949.
I) Plum Pudding
Deux cents cinquate grammes de raisin de
Malaga, deux cinquante gramm' de raisins de
Corinthe; Deux cents cinquante gramm' de graisse
de rognon de boeuf, et cent vingt-cinq gramm' de
mie de pain émietée: Soixante gramm' de sucr'en
poudre ou de cassonade; un verr' de lait; un demi
verr' de rhum ou d'eaudevie; trois oeufs; un
citron! Muscade, gingembre, cannell' en poudre,
mélangés (en tout la moitié d'une cuillère à café.
I) Plum Pudding
Now first you take eleven pounds of juicy Concord
grapes combines with equal parts of extra fine Tokays.
(Be sure they are juicy;) And then you take two cups
or so of breadcrumbs into which you melt a pound or
so of butter, fat, or lard: (Use Spry, or use Crisco.)
Eleven cups of sugar (either brown or white or
powdered); a glass of milk, and half a glass of Bacardi
or brandy; three eggs, and a lemon. Now mustard,
powdered cinnamon, and ginger, all together making
half a teaspoonful of condiment which you combine
with half a teaspoonful of table salt.
II) Queues de Boeuf
La queue de boeuf n'est pas un mets à dédaigner.
D'abord avec assez de queues de boeuf on peut
fair' un potaufeu passable. Les queues qui ont
servi à faire le potaufeu peuv'ent être mangées,
panées, et grillées, et servies avec une sauce
piquante ou tomate. La queue de boeuf n'est pas
un met à dédaigner.
II) Ox-tails
Are you too proud to serve your friends an ox-tail
stew? You're wrong! For if you have enough of
them you'll find you can make a fine ragout.
Remove the tails which you have used to make the
stew, and then you can bread them, and grill them,
and prepare them with a sauce. You'll find them
delicious and diff'rent and so tempting. Are you too
proud to serve your friends an ox-tail stew?
III) Tavouk Gueunksis
Tavouk gueunksis, poitrine de poule; Fait' bouillir
une poul', dont vous prendrez les blancs; vous les
pilerez de facon à ce qu'ils se mett' en charpie.
Puis mêleslez avec une bouillie, comme celle
cidessus de Mahallebi. Tavouk gueunksis,
poitrine de poule.
IV) Civet à Toute Vitesse
Lorsqu'on sera très pressé, voici un' manière de
confectionner un civet de lièvre que je
recommande! Dépecez le lièvre comme pour le
civet ordinaire: Mettezle dans une casserole ou
un chaudron avec son sang et son foie écrasé!
Un' demilivre de poitrine de porc (coupée en
morceaux); une vingtaine de petits oignons (un
peu de sel et poivr'); un litre et demi de vin
rouge. Fait' bouillir à tout' vitesse. Au bout de
quinze minutes environ, lors-que la sauce est
réduite de moitié, approchez un papier
enflammé, de manière à mettre le feu au ragoût.
Lorsqu'il sera éteint, liez la sauce avec un'
demilivre de beurre manié de farine... Servez.
III) Tavouk Gueunksis
Tavouk gueunksis, so Oriental! Put a chicken to
boil, young and tender and sweet; then in the
Arab manner you slice it up into pieces. Then boil
flour and water, and add to it the chicken; then
prepare it as above, in the manner we described
for Mahallebi. Tavouk gueunksis, a Turkish
heaven.
IV) Rabbit at Top Speed
When you have a sudden guest, or you're in an awful
hurry, may I say, here's a way to make a rabbit stew in
no time. Take apart the rabbit in the ordinary way you
do. Put it in a pot or in a casserole, or a bowl with all its
blood and with its liver mashed. Take half a pound of
breast of pork, finely cut (as fine as possible); add little
onions with some pepper and salt (say twenty five or
so); a bottle and a half of rich claret. Boil it up, don't
waste a minute, on the very hottest fire. When boiled a
quarter of an hour or more the sauce should now be half
of what it was before. Then you carefully apply a flame,
as they do in the best, most expensive cafés. After the
flame is out, just add the sauce to half a pound of butter
with flour, and mix them together... and serve.
Translation by Leonard Bernstein
Lee Hoiby describes his Bon Appétit! as "a musical monologue for mezzosoprano and chamber ensemble." The work acts as a musical tribute to the famed cooking
show host of The French Chef, Julia Child and uses her own original words adapted by
Hoiby's long-term librettist and life partner Mark Shulgasser. The Shulgasser libretto
teaches audiences how to make "Le Gâteau au Chocolat l'Eminence Brune," a light
French chocolate cake, similar to a soufflé, adapted from Julia Child's episode on the
"Queen of Sheba Cake," a chocolate and almond rum cake. Although the score was not
published until 1994, the piece was originally performed in 1989 at the Kennedy Center
by Lee Hoiby and Jean Stapleton, the actress known for her role as Edith Bunker in the
1970s sitcom All in the Family.
Bibliography
Bernstein, Leonard. La Bonne Cuisine. London: Boosey & Hawkes, 1949.
"'Ch'io mi scordi di te?' K. 505." LA Philharmonic.
http://www.laphil.com/philpedia/music/chio-mi-scordi-di-te-k-505-wolfgangamadeus-mozart. Accessed October 20, 2015.
Friedberg, Ruth C. and Robin Fisher. American Art Song and American Poetry, 2nd ed.
Plymouth, UK: The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 2012.
Hoiby, Lee. Bon Appétit! Chester, NY: G. Schirmer, Inc., 1989.
Huscher, Phillip. "Program Notes." Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
http://cso.org/uploadedFiles/1_Tickets_and_Events/Program_Notes/ProgramNote
s_Mozart_ChioMiScordi.pdf. Accessed October 20, 2015.
Keller, James M. "Notes on the Program." New York Philharmonic.
http://web.archive.org/web/20060502073359/http://nyphil.org/programNotes/Moz
art%20Piano%20Concerto%20in%20D%20major,%20K.537,%20Coronation.pdf.
Accessed October 20, 2015.
Kimball, Carol. Song; A Guide to Art Song Style and Literature. Milwaukee: Hal Leonard
Corporation, 2005.
Kirkpatrick, David Paul. "Jame's Agee's Masterwork: Knoxville: Summer of 1915 Written in Ninety Minutes." David Paul Kirkpatrick's Living in the Metaverse:
June 30, 2012. http://www.davidpaulkirkpatrick.com/2012/06/30/james-ageesmasterwork-knoxville-summer-of-1915-written-in-ninety-minutes/. Accessed
October 21, 2015.