Fry: Santa Claus Symphony / Niagara Symphony

Description

William Henry Fry (1813-1864)Santa Claus SymphonyOverture to MacbethNiagara SymphonyThe Breaking HeartIn many ways,William Henry Fry, who was born in Philadelphia in 1813 and died in Santa Cruzin the Virgin Islands in 1864, lived a life of firsts. He was the firstnative-born American to write for large symphonic forces, and the first towrite a grand opera. He was the first music critic for a major newspaper, andthe first vociferously to insist that Americans support the music created ontheir own soil.Fry's firsts werenot merely academic, for his life was played out in public view. InPhiladelphia he reviewed music and art for his father's newspapers, laterbecoming an editor. His lave of Italian belcanto, which we can hear in all his music, but especially in hisopera Leonara, started here as hewas exposed to touring companies. From Europe in 1846 to 1852, he dispatchedopinions on culture and politics as correspondent for newspapers inPhiladelphia and New York City. Back in New York working for the Tribune, he gave a series of highlypublicized and admired lectures on the history of music, riveting his audienceswith his encyclopedic knowledge. His early death at 51, apparent1y fromtuberculosis accelerated by exhaustion, elicited tributes from across the land.Fry's music, whenit was heard, was well liked Santa Claus andThe Breaking Heart were playeddozens of times by the Jullien Orchestra, which championed his music on itstour of America Leonora triumphedin Philadelphia in 1845 and New York in 1858 Even critics who took issue withhis outspoken theories and insistent drum-beating for American music lauded hisgifts as a composer.Turning to thefirst work, we see so many remarkable features in Fry's Santa Claus, Christmas Symphony of 1853,that we run the risk of considering it a mere curiosity What Fry called asymphony we might term a fantasy or overture, but by any name it remains atight1y constructed drama full of heady drawing-room romanticism. Fry called it'the longest instrumental composition ever written on a single subject, withunbroken continuity', and he was doubtless correct He composed it for theunsurpassed Jullien soloists, their technique showing in very high passages forthe winds and the violins, and many solos, even a rare one for the double bass.It also seems that this is the first symphonic use anywhere of the newlyinvented saxophone.Fry's meticulouslyfollowed story line deserves a look. The trumpet announces the Saviour's birth,and the celestial host takes up the chorus. The exultation is broken by louddiscords as some of the angels fall away in anger, but harmonious triumphconcludes the section. Now a Christmas Eve party. reunited family, dancing, andgeneral frivolity are depicted in pell-mell joy An impending snowstorm arrivesin the brass, but the dancing resumes, quieter this time as the party-goersleave for home. As sleep descends, Fry employs one of his favorite devices, thesetting of text to instrumental declamation. We hear The Lo