1812 Overture

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Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky wrote the Festival Overture "The Year 1812" in E♭ major, Op. 49 (French: Ouverture solennelle "L'Année 1812"; Russian: Торжественная увертюра 1812 года, Toržestvennaja uvertjura 1812 goda) to commemorate Russia's 1812 defense against Napoleon's advancing Grande Armée at the Battle of Borodino, during the devastating French invasion of Russia. The Overture debuted in the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow on August 20, 1882 (NS; the OS date was 8 August). The overture is best known for its climactic volley of cannon fire and ringing chimes. While this piece has no historical connection with United States history, it is often a staple at Fourth of July celebrations.

Contents 1 Instrumentation 2 Musical structure 3 Composition 3.1 Historical Background: Napoleon's invasion of Russia 3.2 Commission of the overture 4 Performance practice 4.1 Logistics 4.2 Did Tchaikovsky ever hear the piece as written? 5 Recording history 6 Performance History 6.1 Use for United States Independence Day 6.2 Notable performance venues 7 Media use or reference to the overture 8 Media 9 References 10 External links

[edit] Instrumentation

The 1812 Overture is scored for an orchestra comprising piccolo, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, cor anglais, 2 clarinets in B♭, 2 bassoons, 4 horns in F, 2 cornets in B♭, 2 trumpets in E♭, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, triangle, tambourine, snare drum, cymbals, bass drum, carillon (sometimes played on tubular bells or chimes), cannon, strings, and an optional brass band. The cannon part is sometimes replaced by recorded cannons, or played on a piece of staging, usually with a large wooden mallet or sledge hammer. The bass drum and tam-tam are also regularly used in indoor performances. In some indoor performances, the optional brass band part may be played on an organ.

[edit] Musical structure

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Sixteen cannon shots are written into the score of the Overture. Beginning with the plaintive Russian Orthodox hymn "God Preserve Thy People" played by eight cellos and four violas, the piece moves through a mixture of pastoral and militant themes portraying the increasing distress of the Russian people at the hands of the invading French.^[1] At the turning point of the invasion—the Battle of Borodino—the score calls for five Russian cannon shots confronting a boastfully repetitive fragment of La Marseillaise. A descending string passage represents the subsequent attrition of the French forces, followed by victory bells and a triumphant repetition of "God Preserve Thy People" as Moscow burns to deny winter quarters to the French. A musical chase scene appears, out of which emerges the anthem "God Save the Tsar!" thundering with eleven more precisely scored shots.

Although God Save the Tsar! was the Russian National Anthem in Tchaikovsky's time, it was not the anthem in 1812. There was no official Russian anthem until 1815, from which time until 1833 the anthem was "Molitva russkikh", Prayer of the Russians, sung to the tune of God Save the King.

[edit] Composition

[edit] Historical Background: Napoleon's invasion of Russia

Main article: French invasion of Russia

On September 7, 1812, 120 km (75 miles) west of Moscow at Borodino, Napoleon’s forces met those of General Mikhail Illarionovich Kutuzov in the only concerted stand made by Russia against the seemingly invincible French army. The Battle of Borodino saw casualties estimated as high as 100,000 and produced victory for neither side. It did, however, break the back of the French invasion.

With resources depleted and supply lines overextended, Napoleon’s crippled forces moved into Moscow, which was surrendered without resistance. Expecting capitulation from the displaced Tsar Alexander I, the French instead found themselves in a barren and desolate city razed to the ground by the retreating Russian Army.

Deprived of winter quarters, Napoleon found it necessary to retreat. Beginning on October 19 and lasting well into December, the French army faced several overwhelming obstacles on its long retreat: famine, frigid temperatures, and Russian forces barring the way out of the country. Abandoned by Napoleon in December, the largest army ever assembled had been reduced to one-tenth its original size by the time it reached Poland.

[edit] Commission of the overture

In 1880 the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour, commissioned by Tsar Alexander II to commemorate the French defeat, was nearing completion in Moscow; the 25th anniversary of the coronation of Alexander II would be at hand in 1881; and the 1882 Moscow Arts and Industry Exhibition was in the planning stage. Tchaikovsky's friend and mentor Nikolay Rubinstein suggested that a grand commemorative piece for use in related festivities. The work was commissioned by what we would call today the Red Cross.^{[citation needed]} Tchaikovsky began work on the project on October 12, 1880, finishing it six weeks later.

The piece was planned to be performed in the square before the cathedral, with a brass band to reinforce the orchestra, the bells of the cathedral and all the others in downtown Moscow playing "zvons" (pealing bells) on cue, and live cannonfire in accompaniment, fired from an electric switch panel in order to achieve the precision demanded by the musical score in which each shot was specifically written. This performance did not actually take place. The plan may have been too ambitious. Regardless, the assassination of Alexander II that March deflated much of the reason behind the project. In 1882, at the Arts and Industry Exhibition, the Overture was performed indoors with conventional orchestration. The cathedral was completed in 1883.

Meanwhile, Tchaikovsky complained to his patron Nadezhda von Meck that he was "not a concocter of festival pieces," and that the Overture would be "very loud and noisy, but [without] artistic merit, because I wrote it without warmth and without love," adding himself to the legion of artists who from time to time have castigated their own work. It is the work that would have made the Tchaikovsky estate exceptionally wealthy, as it is one of the most performed and recorded works from his catalog.

[edit] Performance practice

[edit] Logistics

Logistics of safety and precision in placement of the shots require either well-drilled military crews using modern cannon, or else the use of sixteen pieces of muzzle-loading artillery, since any reloading schemes to attain the sixteen shots or even a semblance of them in the two minute time span involved makes safety and precision impossible with 1800s artillery. Time lag alone precludes implementation of cues for the shots for 1812-era field pieces.

[edit] Did Tchaikovsky ever hear the piece as written?

Musicologists questioned across the last third of a century have given no indication that the composer ever heard the Overture performed in authentic accordance with the 1880 plan. It is reported that he asked permission to perform the piece as planned in Berlin, but was denied it. Performances he conducted on U.S. and European tours were apparently done with simulated or at best inexact shots, if with shots at all, a custom universal until recent years.

Antal Dorati and Erich Kunzel are the first conductors to have encouraged exact fidelity of the shots to the written score in live performances, beginning in New York and Connecticut as part of Dorati's recording and Kunzel in Cincinnati in 1967 with assistance from J. Paul Barnett, of South Bend, Indiana.^[2] Of recorded versions of these performances, Dorati's recording for Mercury Records is the more faithful performance. Dorati uses an actual carillon called for in the score and the bells are rung about as close to a zvon then known. The art of zvon ringing was almost lost due to the Russian Revolution^{[citation needed]}. The Dorati recording also uses actual period French cannon for the 1812 period, which belonged to the United States Military Academy at West Point.

[edit] Recording history

• A 1927 Cleveland recording contains dozens of bass drum "shots" at random in the final moments of the piece.
• A Royal Opera Orchestra recording of about the same time contains no shots at all. Various more recent recordings feature modern or antique artillery firing in approximation of the score, and other improvisations and bell sounds from tubular chimes to fake bell sounds which do no zvon ringing.
• Antal Dorati’s landmark 1954 Mercury Records recording with the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra (recorded in mono in 1954 and in stereo in 1958), partially recorded at West Point, and using the Yale Memorial Carillon (then a mere chime) in Hartford, Connecticut, uses a period French single muzzleloading cannon shot dubbed in 16 times as written, and was such an advancement in authenticity that on the first edition of the recording, one side played the Overture and the other side played a narrative by Deems Taylor about how the feat was accomplished. The stereophonic version was recorded on April 5, 1958 using the bells of the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial Carillon, at Riverside Church. On this Mercury Living Presence Stereo recording the spoken commentary was also given by Deems Taylor and was coupled with Tchaikovsky's "Capriccio Italien". Later editions coupled the 1812 Overture with Dorati's recording of Beethoven's Wellington's Victory, which featured the London Symphony Orchestra and real cannons.

• Later recordings have been variously done by similar means. The Black Dyke Mills Brass Band have also recorded a brass band arrangement of the piece. This recording includes the cannon shots as originally written. In 1990, in a worldwide celebration of the 150th anniversary of Tchaikovsky’s birth, the Overture was recorded in the city of his youth by the St. Petersburg Philharmonic using 16 muzzleloading cannons fired live as written in the 1880 score. That recording was done within earshot of the composer’s grave.

[edit] Performance History

[edit] Use for United States Independence Day

The United States, itself somewhat short of patriotic hymns, had through the 19th century developed an affinity for Tchaikovsky. The Overture began to be used occasionally for the country's Independence Day starting with Chicago's Grant Park Orchestra performance in 1935, though this usage was sporadic over the years. It wasn't until 1974 when Arthur Fiedler elected to have the Boston Pops play it with accompanying fireworks, real cannons and a coordinated steeple-bell choir to increase attendance that the work become a staple of the holiday. The performance was broadcast across the country, and the 1812 Overture, not widely known by Cold War-era Americans to be a Russian victory piece, became associated with the Fourth of July.^[3]

[edit] Notable performance venues

• The Boston Pops Orchestra plays the Overture annually on Independence Day for "Pops Goes The Fourth." It is one of the best-attended July 4th celebrations in the country and it takes place on the Charles River Esplanade at the Hatch Shell. The performance is accompanied by real cannons from the 101st Field Artillery Regiment, Massachusetts National Guard, the bells from the Church of the Advent, and by fireworks over the Charles River.
• The National Symphony Orchestra plays the Overture as part of the finale to the A Capitol Fourth concert on the Capitol lawn in Washington, D.C. each Independence Day, featuring the guns of the 3rd United States Infantry Regiment Presidential Salute Battery. However, recent performances have featured only the climax of the overture, not the entire fifteen minute piece.
• The United States Army Band "Pershing's Own" performs the 1812 Overture at the National Sylvan Theater, Washington, DC, USA, every August. The performance is highlighted with real cannons of the 3rd United States Infantry Regiment Presidential Salute Battery.
• The Richmond Concert Band plays the Overture annually on July 4th at Dogwood Dell in Richmond, Virginia. The performance is accompanied by real cannons (howitzers) from the 2nd Battalion, 111th Field Artillery, Virginia National Guard, on-site live carillon bells by Larry Robinson located in the Richmond World War I Memorial, and fireworks over the stage by Pyrotechnics.
• The 1812 Overture is performed annually as the finale of the Oregon Symphony Waterfront Concert in August. The Oregon Symphony has traditionally hosted the Oregon National Guard whose cannon fire is conducted by a second conductor and remote operated traffic lights.
• The 1812 Overture is played annually at the Hollywood Bowl's Tchaikovsky Spectacular, with fireworks over the Bowl.
• The 1812 Overture is played each January by the Sydney Symphony to conclude the popular Symphony in the Domain concert, with the bells of St Mary's Cathedral, Sydney tolling in the background. It is also played annually by the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra at the Santos Limited 'Symphony Under the Stars' concert.
• The 1812 Overture is played each year by the Royal Military College Band — at Duntroon in Canberra, Australia - complete with real artillery and fireworks.
• The 1812 is the closing piece in the Starlight Symphony held in the Auckland Domain, Auckland, New Zealand every summer. The New Zealand Army fires a single shot from a 105mm towed gun as symbolic cannon fire, timed with the final shot of the last fusillade.
• One of the most elaborate performances is at the conclusion of the Westerly, RI Summer Pops concert, which has been performed on the first Saturday of every summer since 1981. It features the Boston Festival Orchestra, the Chorus of Westerly performing an arrangement of God Preserve Thy People in Russian at the beginning and again after (as is written into the choral arrangement) "about 12 minutes rest", cannon fire by The Artillery Group of Newport in 1800's Russian military uniforms, carillon from the Christ Church bell tower, and a Grucci fireworks display over the finale.
• The Kingston Symphony Orchestra performed the 1812 Overture on July 18 and July 19, 2008 at historic Fort Henry in Kingston, Ontario, Canada (a UNESCO World Heritage Site). The performance included the use of live cannons.
• The Mattel cooperative board game Break the Safe includes a Moog synthesized version of the overture which plays when the game is won. It is heard after the sound of the four keys being inserted in the slots and the safe dial turning around.

[edit] Media use or reference to the overture

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Tchaikovsky's 1812 is often alluded to in other artistic creations, especially where conflict is an important theme. Examples include:

• A fragment of 1812 appears in the score by Andre Previn for Every Good Boy Deserves Favour (1977), a play for actors and orchestra by Tom Stoppard. The play is set in a Russian mental hospital to which dissidents are consigned during the Soviet era. In this context the French themes such as "La Marseillaise" symbolize independence of spirit.
• For several years, the overture was used as the background score by the Australian Government in Army Reserve recruiting advertisements.
• In the movie V for Vendetta (film) by James McTeigue (2006), the main character V has set up two terroristic attacks on the Old Bailey and the Houses of Parliament. During the explosions fragments of the 1812 sound through the streets of England.
• In the Beatles' movie Help! at the end of the Salisbury Plain sequence which pokes fun at wartime maneuvers, the last part of 1812 starts playing after Clang's Kaili Army believes they have just shot the Beatles (and Ahme), who were taking refuge in a moving tank, and celebrate their victory. Eventually, it turns out just before the tank got shot, the Beatles and Ahme had sneakily escaped and hid in bales of hay. "There must be somewhere in England where one can find sanctuary long enough to think," Ahme muses as they emerge from the hay.
• The finale of Tchaikovsky's "1812 Overture" is used in the Canadian rock band Rush's "2112 Overture" from their 1976 album 2112.

1812 has also been the subject of humour:

• Peter Schikele pokes fun at the incongruous association of 1812 with American patriotic celebrations in Overture 1712 for "really big orchestra." The piece, ostensibly written by P. D. Q. Bach in the colonial era, echoes Tchaikovsky gesture for gesture while replacing the opening theme with "Yankee Doodle" and the quotations of La Marseillaise with Pop Goes the Weasel.
• In the film comedy Bananas, Woody Allen and an unidentified woman strip to make love in slow motion to the strains of the Overture's finale, heard complete with cannons.
• Three episodes of 2 Stupid Dogs feature a nearsighted Little Red Riding Hood who sings the 1812 music as she gallops along.
• In the Farscape episode "Crichton Kicks" John Crichton adopts a DRD during his stay on an ailing leviathan. He teaches it to play a simplified, electric version of the song. It serves almost as Crichton's pet and makes several appearances during the remainder of the series.

[edit] Media

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Article from 2003 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on how “1812” has become a piece of patriotic Americana
• Russian national anthem “God Save the Tsar” in Tchaikovsky’s music — contains several audio recordings of the 1812 Overture.
• 1812 Ouverture: Free scores at the International Music Score Library Project.