I attended Morlot Conducts Brahms 1, in part of the 2014-2015 Lilly Classical Series at Hilbert Circle Theatre. I originally was scheduled to see Copland and Gershwin with Michael Morgan, a fellow student in this class but had to cancel due to an illness that put me in the hospital. So I bought tickets to see the Conductor Laureate Raymond Leppard, but he had to cancel due to health issues. The concert I attended was downtown, and I live downtown so the drive wasn’t far at all. I used Hilbert’s valet service that cost me $15 but I was worth it that way I wouldn’t have to waste any time looking for parking. Once I got into the building there was a little room located to the right between two sets of doors, I picked up my tickets there and entered the main lobby, there was a lot of people there, I noticed that most people were with larger groups, so I felt a little out of place because I was standing alone. I walked around and looked at the different tables that were set up with informational brochures. Once they opened the doors to the stage area the concert that was being held before, the Children’s Symphony, was released and we could go in and take our seats. As soon as I entered the area I was astonished, it was beautiful. Once I sat down I waited about 5 minutes then the concert began. I heard cymbals, tubas, French horns, trombones, bassoons, violas, cellos, violins, bass drums, timpani, violins, and many others. This whole concert was SCARY! My heart was racing almost the entire time. I don’t think I could have chosen a better concert to go to! I really enjoyed the cadenzas in the second movement. It was a nice break from the intensity of the rest of the music. I have never attended a concert so this will be my determining factor for how I judge other concerts and it defiantly set the bar high! Ludovic Morlot was the conductor for this concert. He is a French conductor for the Seattle Symphony. He was named Affiliate professor at the University of Washington in 2012. He was originally trained as a violinist, and later attended the Royal Academy of Music and began conducting music in London in 1994. He later came to the US and attended Pierre Monteux School for Conductors. In the first movement, Overture Les Frances- Juges, Op. 3, the genre is Opera. The melody is scary, this piece contained a lot of notes. It was in both duple and triple meters at different points in the piece. In is in Sonata Form. The exposition started off very mysterious, it had a very sorrowful sound. The violins crescendo into a high pitched scream and then the horns join in as the violins become less apparent. After the cadenza I heard five instruments playing together including string instruments, and some woodwinds. According to the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra pamphlet handed out for this concert, one of the woodwinds being played at this part is a flageolet, which is an instrument played by Hector Berlioz as a child. In the development the violins play in a very violent manner but softly enough that I could still hear flutes and oboes in the background. This part made me feel terrified, my heart rate increased and I even felt a flutter of fear! I remember clasping my hands in my lap very tightly together. A quote I obtained from hberlioz.com recounted Hector saying “... I longed to cry out, forgetting that it was my own work! How colossal and monstrous!” The recapitulation follows with the violins screeching again this time in a different meter also with different woodwinds added into the mix. Finally the coda satisfied my horrified imagination, with violins playing softly at first the crescendo into a wonderful orchestra including various woodwind instruments such as oboes, bassoons, and French horns. The texture is Polyphony, with a random pattern with multiple instruments. I found some very interesting historical information on this piece. The title of this piece means “The Free Judges” which is a reference to the Vehmic Court in The Middle Ages. These court proceedings were sometimes held in secrecy. Members of the court would not be allowed to speak of it or even tell their families. The Vehmic court would execute a person and then hang the dead body from a tree to advertise the fact that they had killed a person for a certain reason in order to deter others from committing the same “crime”. If a preceding was in session and a nonmember was seen they would immediately put that person to death. After looking more into this musical piece I now understand why it was so dark and scary. Another tidbit of information I found on hberlioz.com, The Official Hector Berlioz Website, is that this particular piece was unfinished, he destroyed most of it but retained the beginning. The second movement, Concerto in D Major for Piano is a Piano Concerto, The texture is Polyphony. It is written in concerto form. Normally Concertos have three movements, Fast, Slow, Fast. But this concerto is Slow, Fast, Slow. The concerto begins with multiple basses playing a very low tone, then the orchestra very slowly joins in, and crescendos into a beautiful yet terrifying sound, I could hear violins playing a trill adding mystery to the piece, then suddenly the music hits a cadenza, and the piano solo begins in low notes and creates a powerful statement, I almost couldn’t believe that with is written for just the left hand! An upward glissando ends the first cadenza and the orchestra responds with woodwinds such as flutes, clarinets, oboes and you hear a drum beat in the background temporarily, creating a dramatic lead to yet another cadenza, this time starting in a lighter tone than the last. It’s a wonderful break from all of the dramatic low key notes. Then woodwinds join in and soon the entire orchestra emerges into a grand climax. The piece concludes with a final cadenza that includes multiple themes. It contains both duple and triple meters. I would use the word dissonance to describe the harmony. This piece had a lot of notes! Something interesting about this concerto is the composer of this piece, Maurice Ravel accepted a commission from the Australian pianist Paul Wittgenstein to write a piano concerto for the left hand. Wittgenstein was called to the war against Russia in WWI He was severely wounded in battle and fell unconscious and later woke up a prisoner of the Russian army with his right hand missing. He never gave up his dream of becoming a pianist, he adapted, developing a massive technique just using his left hand.