A NOTE FROM YUQI LIANG ’23
ON MENDELSSOHN’S THE HEBRIDES
In the summer of 1829, Mendelssohn took a trip to the British Isle and visited Fingal’s Cave on
the Scottish island of Staffa. The stunning seascape no doubt left a deep impression on him,
for he quickly produced a drawing of the island and jotted down a musical idea, the latter of
which he sent to his family in a letter. The musical sketch contains detailed instructions for
dynamics and orchestral instrumentation and, with surprisingly little revision, turns out to be
the opening phrase of today’s Hebrides Overture. Although the Overture is meant as an
evocative piece from the start, Mendelssohn takes great care to develop the composition into
its final form. According to the musicologist R. Larry Todd, the Overture has been transmitted
in at least four complete versions, with four different titles. A careful study of the score reveals
intricate connections among different sections of the piece. The Overture opens with basses
and violins holding an open-fifth, while cellos, violas, and bassoons enter with a descending
melodic motif. The music intensifies and grows in complexity before it reaches the second
theme in the relative major, an expressive melody with glimmering accompaniment that is
suggestive of the rolling waves and the majesty of the island. As the music develops, we may
also hear horns that announce the passing of ships, the sound of seagulls, and a terrifying
storm followed by total serenity. All the different scenery and characters, however, can find
their origin in the opening phrase. I am very grateful for the opportunity of studying
conducting with Maestro Pratt over the past four years. It is an experience that has led to
much musical and personal growth. And I am truly excited for this culminating performance of
Mendelssohn’s Hebrides Overture with the Princeton University Orchestra.

A NOTE FROM WILLIAM E. RUNYAN
ON BEETHOVEN’S CONCERTO FOR VIOLIN, CELLO, AND PIANO OP.56
The concerto in its various guises has long been an important part of the symphonic literature,
going back to the middle of the seventeenth century. But by Beethoven’s time, some 150
years on, concertos were most often written for one instrument—usually piano, violin, or
‘cello–with orchestral accompaniment. Of course, many fine compositions were written for
other solo instruments: predominantly any of the woodwinds, horn, or trumpet. But, piano,
violin, or ‘cello were the stars—and so it has remained. Beethoven, a virtuoso pianist, wrote
five significant piano concertos, initially of course to showcase himself, and an important violin
concerto. But, the concerto that he composed in 1803 for three solo instruments and
orchestra stands apart for several reasons. It’s the only concerto that he wrote for more than
one solo instrument, and in the rest of the nineteenth century not very many of them were
written at all.

Now the idea of a group of soloists accompanied by an orchestra was not a new one by that
time, for an important genre of the Baroque era was the concerto grosso. And during the time
of Haydn, Mozart, and frères, the so-called sinfonia concertante, along with the concerto
grosso, exploited the idea of a group of soloists accompanied by an orchestra. But, there was
a rub. By Beethoven’s time, and especially with the great man himself, musical style had
moved to one of extended musical architecture, driven by an integral emphasis of developing
and manipulating musical ideas, and a greater rôle for the accompanying orchestra. All of
these factors didn’t leave as much room (and time) for multiple soloists to fully occupy the
limelight. So, simple traffic control between the soloists and the orchestra posed structural
problems. To allow each of the soloists to develop and expand on their material and share
ideas with each other—not to speak of giving the orchestra a significant part–would have
made for compositions that were just too long and unwieldy, among other things.

But great artists meet difficulties that deter lesser folks, and Beethoven was more than up to
the job. Just why he wrote his “triple concerto” is subject to some conjecture, but there is
some evidence that he had in mind as his pianist his well-known pupil and patron, Archduke
Rudolf of Austria—the Emperor’s son. The Archduke studied both piano and composition with
Beethoven for almost two decades, and became a very creditable pianist—his patronage was
significant financial support for Beethoven, and the two were close friends to boot. Several of
the composer’s finest works are dedicated to the young archduke. Some speculate that the
somewhat easier piano part, compared with the two string soloists, is evidence that the
archduke was the pianist in mind, but that’s not established. In any case, at the première in
1808, the archduke was neither the pianist, nor the dedicatee in the earlier publication.

Cast in the usual three movements, the extensive first movement, full of gravitas, has a
conventional first-movement form of several themes, appropriately worked through, with
recapitulation and coda. The following largo is quite brief, and leads directly into a substantial,
energetic rondo.

The first movement begins quietly, with the main theme heard immediately in the low strings
—there will be several more in the structure of this rather complicated movement. You can
spot the next main idea when the woodwinds take it. Finally, our soloists enter, the ‘cello—as it
does frequently in this concerto—taking the lead. Throughout this movement—given that
three soloists have to be given ample opportunity to shine—one does not hear much as one
would expect of the composer’s vaunted ability to develop and extend aphoristic ideas.
Rather, somewhat in the manner of Schubert, there’s just a lot of delightful repetition. So, the
listener gets to hear a lot of familiar material, as each soloist takes his turn, with a constant
trading back and forth between the three. The movement is in a rather complicated
sonata/concerto form, but that needn’t detain us. The pleasure in this substantial movement is
in following the variety of the constant interplay, as well as the entertaining tunes and
enterprising harmonic turns. A quick little, almost perfunctory, coda, with the requisite
cascading scales, brings us to the end.

The ensuing slow movement is an elegant example of one of Beethoven’s most endearing
characteristics. In like manner to the beloved slow movements of his solo piano concertos, it
leisurely and serenely spins out a remarkable long-breathed melody of breathtaking beauty
and eloquence. The key is Ab, a relationship to the main key of the work that is a favorite of
the composer, and a decidedly “romantic” characteristic. It provides a surprising, breathtaking
harmonic moment at its inception. As in other parts of the concerto the ‘cello take the lead,
singing out in its higher register, before yielding to the violin, which takes its turn with the
same material. Throughout the movement the piano stays in the background, providing a
filigree accompaniment. After a short time, all three instruments participate in a kind of dance
of teasing give and take, and we’re quickly into the boisterous Rondo alla polacca of the last
movement.

Rondos are a popular form for last movements, for they are tuneful, energetic, and the
“roadmap” easily followed. Typically, a clear, sharply profiled main theme is followed by a
variety of contrasting sections, most not too long, and the main theme entertains by
constantly returning. Nothing lasts too long, everything is usually pellucid, and on the whole
it’s a welcome contrast to the seriousness and complexity of what went before. In this
particular rondo, Beethoven chose the time signature of three beats to the measure, with the
characteristic dance accents of a polonaise. The main theme appears immediately, first in the
‘cello and quickly taken up by the violin. Without much delay we’re into the contrasting
material, much of it figurations. The orchestra then thunders in shortly with the main theme—
this is a rondo, after all. And so it goes—the middle section has an attractive turn to the minor
mode. With each solo section, each of the soloists burns through increasingly impressive
virtuosic figures, as Beethoven cunningly builds to a climax—interspersed with typical
Beethovenian dramatic pauses, before bolting off again. Moving ahead, the composer turns
on the heat with a turn to duple metre, allowing the tempo to really surge in a blazing coda. A
massive tutti statement of the main polacca theme brings us to the triumphant end. The
“Triple Concerto” may be somewhat of a stepchild of Beethoven’s concertos, not garnering
near as many performances as the solo works, but it is marvelously entertaining, and a tour de
force of handling a treacherous musical architecture.

A NOTE FROM HANNAH MCLAUGHLIN
ON STRAUSS’S EIN HELDENLEBEN
Put simply, Richard Strauss’s tone poem Ein Heldenleben (“A Hero’s Life,” 1898) illustrates the
life, struggles and accomplishments of a hero. Though conceived as a single-movement work,
it divides neatly into five sections, tentatively titled by the composer:

—The Hero (Der Held)
—The Hero’s Enemies (Widersacher)
—The Hero’s Companion (Gafährtin),
—The Hero’s Field of Battle (Walstatt)
—The Hero’s Works of Peace (Friedenswerke)
—The Hero’s Escape from the World (Weltflucht) and Consummation (Vollendung)

Who exactly is the Held of Der Heldenleben? The composer himself insisted that the work
portrayed no specific figure at all, but rather the quintessential ideal of “great and manly”
heroism. Strauss also outright denied that he, himself, was the subject of his work: “I’m no
hero,” he wrote, “I’m not made for battle.” Yet despite this testimony, scholars have insisted on
an autobiographical reading of Der Heldenleben. This includes music critic Richard Freed,
who contended that the music itself “pointed stubbornly to its own author as its subject work,”
betraying the composer’s verbal conviction.

The music of Der Heldenleben betrays the composer’s commentary in another way. “Great
and manly” were Strauss’s words. And yet, something else lies beneath – something
seemingly diminutive, yet immensely powerful and achingly beautiful.

If there is an important consistency in Strauss’s oeuvre,” says Bryan Gillman, “it is in the desire
to suggest the profundities and ambiguities in everyday life, even in the apparently banal.”
How do we reconcile Strauss’s supposed preoccupation with the ordinary and unexceptional
with a piece like Der Heldenleben – a work depicting the life of an extraordinary and
exceptional person? The music itself does not offer an obvious answer. The stately first
movement, for example, alludes to what Joseph Campbell calls the heroic transcendence of
the mundane, a venturing forth “from the world of common day into a region of supernatural
wonder.” Strauss’s hero swats adversaries like flies in Part 2, battles cosmic forces in Part 4,
and ushers in a reign of victorious peace in Part 5. In these dignified sections, the hero stands
as Supernal Deity, Promethean Deliverer, and Philosopher King all rolled into one.

But while much of Heldenleben appears self-aggrandizing, true victory for the work’s
protagonist lies not in his own might, but in his relationship with another. This Gefährtin –
literally, a fellow-traveler (fahren means “to travel”) – is the subject of the work’s third section.
Her movement, the longest in the work, employs a rigorous and poignant violin solo, one
providing crucial material which will later constitute the work’s culminating finale. Without this
third movement, the entire narrative trajectory of the tone poem collapses.

But at the same time, the relationship depicted here is one defined by intimacy, domesticity,
and privacy. This relationship is also extremely prosaic – an intense contrast to the
monumental subject matter surrounding it.

Strauss’s Gefährten was his wife, Paulina de Ahna. An ambitious and talented singer, Paulina
embodied well for Strauss the role of “fellow-traveler.” As his student, she followed him first to
Weimar in 1889. At 30 years old, she decided (with hesitancy) to marry Richard. While she
hoped to continue stage performance after the marriage, it was only two years before she
made the “great, beautiful sacrifice” (Strauss’s words) to suspend her career for the sake of her
husband’s. She would follow Richard for the rest of her life, despite extreme difficulties in their
marriage. They would settle in Munich and then tour together through Europe and America.
Her final public appearance as a vocalist occurred in January 1909. She lived another 40 years
after this, dying in 1950.

Many have made similar sacrifices as Paulina. Women, especially, continue to endure the
unending tension between career ambitions and family obligations. But men can also feel this
tension. It seems Strauss felt it.

Of course, one cannot overlook the patriarchal lens through which Strauss viewed notions of
gender. Beyond this, Strauss also bemoaned the dormant lifestyle, complaining that there was
nothing to do at his Bavaria summer home but play cards. But this was Germany’s most
prominent composer at the height of his career, entangled in the thick stresses of public
musical life. The allure of home – family, private comforts, peace and quiet – surely was very
strong for Strauss. Der Heldenleben is a testament to this hunger – not only for heroic heights,
but also for domestic bliss.

In a late-career interview with the composer, the critic Deems Taylor observed how Strauss
could not enter his own house without wiping his feet three separate times. “Strauss may be a
good conductor and a great composer,” said Taylor, “but… for that moment I saw, for a flash,
the truth. Here was no Titan or demigod; before me stood only a married man.” In Der
Heldenleben, Taylor’s final statement is proven wrong; the hero is never only a married man.
In fact, it may even be in his homebound “condescension” where the hero finds his greatest
strength. In Der Heldenleben, we witness the hero’s truest and most complete form: titanic
demigod and married man, dauntless hero and doting husband. Both sides of this dual
identity seem necessary. In returning home, one finds true “escape from the world” implied in
the work’s final movement. To one like Strauss, such satisfying consummation after a long
lifetime of heroic deeds could only be found in those cozy and confidential moments
between bedroom walls, over warm hearths, or within the sheltered refuge of the backyard
fence. Such a desire is surely not exclusive to Strauss. Indeed, as we all progress through
miniature Heldenlebens of our own, do we all not find ourselves, once in a while, aching for
that same refuge, be it ever so humble?

MICHAEL PRATT
The 2022 – 2023 season marks 45 years since Michael Pratt came to Princeton to conduct
the Princeton University Orchestra — a relationship that has resulted in the ensemble’s
reputation as one of the finest university orchestras in the United States. He is credited by his
colleagues and generations of students in being the architect of one of the finest music
programs in the country, Princeton’s certificate Program in Music Performance, Pratt has
served as its director since its inception in 1991. The international reputation the Program has
earned has resulted in Princeton’s becoming a major destination for talented and
academically gifted students. Pratt also established a partnership between Princeton and the
Royal College of Music that every year sends Princeton students to study in London. He is
also co-founder of the Richardson Chamber Players, which affords opportunities for tops
students to perform with the performance faculty in chamber music concerts.

Over the years, Pratt has guided many generations of Princeton students through a
remarkable variety of orchestral and operatic literature, from early Baroque Italian opera
through symphonies of Mahler to the latest compositions by students and faculty. He has led
the Princeton University Orchestra on eleven European tours. Under Pratt, PUO has also
participated in major campus collaborations with the Theater and Dance programs in such
works as the premieres of Prokofiev’s Le Pas d’Acier and Boris Godunov, a revival of Richard
Strauss’s setting of the Molière classic, Le Bourgeois gentilhomme, and a full production of A
Midsummer Night’s Dream, with all of Mendelssohn’s incidental music.

Pratt was educated at the Eastman School of Music and Tanglewood, and his teachers and
mentors have included Gunther Schuller, Gustav Meier, and Otto Werner Mueller. In March
2018 Michael Pratt was awarded an honorary membership to the Royal College of Music,
London (HonRCM) by future King Charles III, then HRH The Prince of Wales. At
Commencement 2019 he was awarded the President’s Award for Distinguished Teaching by
President Christopher Eisgruber.

YUQI LIANG ’23
Yuqi Liang is a senior in the Philosophy department and pursuing Certificates in Music
Performance and Composition. He started playing the violin at age four- and-a-half and
studied at the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, China when he was in elementary
and middle school. At Princeton, he is an active member of the Princeton University
Orchestra and the Princeton Undergraduate Composers Collective, and he studies orchestral
conducting with Michael Pratt, violin performance with Anna Lim, and piano with Francine
Kay. After Princeton, Yuqi is planning to pursue postgraduate work in philosophy and hopes
to draw connections between his two main areas of interest.

ROBIN PARK ’23
Robin Park (b. 2001) is a cellist hailing from Fort Lee, NJ. Throughout his career, he has won
many accolades, most recently winning First Prize in the 5th Gustav Mahler Cello
Competition, the Princeton University Concerto Competition, as well as Grand Prizes in the
Caprio Competition, Sinfonietta Nova Competition, and the Newtown Chamber Orchestra
Competition. Accordingly, he has performed as a soloist with multiple orchestras, including
the Riverside Symphonia and Newtown Chamber Orchestra. Robin is the current Associate
Principal Cellist of Symphony in C, and was the former Principal Cellist of the 2022 Pacific
Music Festival Orchestra and the 2019 National Youth Orchestra of the USA, and is also a
two-time alumnus of the New York String Orchestra Seminar. An avid chamber musician,
Robin is the former Music Director of Opus Chamber Music Princeton, and is a frequent
performer on pianist Per Tengstrand’s concert series “Music on Park Avenue” at NYC’s
Scandinavia House, as well as on Symphony in C’s Virtuosi Series and the Suburban Music
Study Club’s Morning Musicale. Following his love of chamber music, Robin will be attending
the Kneisel Hall Music Festival in the summer of 2023, and in the fall of 2023, will be
continuing his studies at the Yale School of Music (YSM) as an M.M. student. Robin studied
with Richard Aaron while attending Princeton University, where he will be graduating with a
B.A. in History, and will be studying with cellist Paul Watkins of the Emerson Quartet at the
YSM. Robin plays on an 1820 English Thomas Kennedy Cello.

MYLES MCKNIGHT ’23
Myles McKnight is a senior in the Department of Politics. Originally from Asheville, North
Carolina, he is an alumnus of the Brevard Music Center, where he led the Brevard Concert
Orchestra through several seasons as concertmaster. In 2019, he led the National Youth
Orchestra as concertmaster on a highly publicized tour that included performances at the
BBC Proms, the Royal Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Konzerthaus Berlin, and the
Edinburgh International Festival. At Princeton, he studies violin with Professor Eric Wyrick. In
addition to his involvement in Princeton’s music scene, he is the former president of the
Princeton Open Campus Coalition, managing editor of the Princeton Legal Journal, and crew
member of the sailing team, among other things.

KIMBERLY SHEN ’24
Kimberly, also known as Kimie, is a pianist hailing from the snowy suburbs of Minneapolis, MN.
She is currently a student of Francine Kay and previously studied with Alexander Braginsky
and Jean Krinke. She has performed as a soloist in recitals and masterclasses at various venues
in the United States and Europe. In addition to her solo work, Kimie is also an avid chamber
musician. She has fond memories of learning and performing Brahms’s Op. 8 Piano Trio with
Myles and Robin during her first semester on campus. Accordingly, she is thrilled to be
reuniting with them for Beethoven’s Triple Concerto. At Princeton, Kimie is a junior
concentrating in physics and pursuing certificates in classical piano performance and applied
mathematics. When not practicing piano or getting hopelessly stuck on math problems she
enjoys sleeping, hanging out with friends and collecting stuffed animals.

THE PRINCETON UNIVERSITY ORCHESTRA
The Princeton University Orchestra was born in February 1896, with a concert by
professional musicians. The modern history of PUO begins with the appointment of the
orchestra’s present music director, Michael J. Pratt, in 1977. Through the fifties and
sixties, the ensemble shrank down to as few as thirty students amid “music-is-better
seen-than-heard” mentalities in music academia, as well as insufficient rehearsal and
performance spaces on campus. Following Pratt’s appointment to the orchestra’s
podium, this downward trend quickly reversed itself into an upwards explosion. In 1984,
the orchestra’s home, Alexander Hall, was renovated from a large auditorium into a
professional-grade concert hall. Additionally, unprecedented interest in music
performance among students, coupled with growth in the overall undergraduate class
size and the development of Princeton’s dedicated extracurricular hours (two hours
every weekday during which classes are forbidden from meeting), allowed PUO to
quickly expand into the large symphonic orchestra of over 100 students that it remains
today.

In response to students in the orchestra expressing a desire to continue as musicians
after their studies at Princeton, Michael Pratt established the Music Department’s
Certificate Program in Music Performance in 1990, and he was a major architect in the
general integration of performance into Princeton’s wider curriculum. Undergraduate
musicians in the Music Performance certificate receive complementary lessons and are
eligible to spend a semester abroad studying at the Royal College of Music, which has
been named one of the top music conservatories in the world. Following the creation of
a strong music performance program, the conductor noted a significant upswing in
Princeton University applicants with exceptional musical talent and interest, which in
turn allowed the Princeton University Orchestra to grow into an even stronger
ensemble, able to tackle any piece in the classical repertoire. In 2018, there were
enough applicants to the incoming class alone to fill multiple large symphonic
orchestras.

Nowadays, the orchestra is recognized for its musical excellence, named in an
independent survey as one of the top ten college-age orchestras in the United States.

PERFORMERS

* Denotes Concertmaster
+ Denotes Principal Player
~ Denotes On Leave
*^ Ein Heldenleben Soloist Saturday
*# Ein Heldenleben Soloist Sunday

Violin I
Rachel Hsu *# ’23
Melody Choi *^
Myles McKnight ’23
Adrian Rogers ’23
Abby Nishiwaki ’23
Sea Yoon ’23
Madeline Yu ’23
Iroha Shirai ’23
Sophia Zheng ’23
Luca Stewart
Andrew Liu
Kodai Speich
Nina Shih
Victor Chu ’23
Claire Schmeller ’23
Andrew Park

Violin II
Yuqi Liang + ’23
Amy Baskurt
Isabella Khan
Andi Grene
Haram Kim
James Han
David Opong
Miriam Waldvogel
Allison Jiang
Kevin Tsai
Kelly Kim
Margaret Miao
Eleanor Clemans-Cope
Andrew Chi
Tienne Yu
Andrew Guo ~
Soonyoung Kwon ~
Abigail Stafford ~
Natalie Wong ~
Evan Zhou ~

Viola
Jack Shigeta + ’23
Rohan Jinturkar ’23
Michael Fording ’23
Andrew Jung
Albert Zhou
Sol Choi
Georgia Post
Justin Yi
Watson Jia ’21 G’23
Anna Shin
Hannah Su
Dorothy Junginger
Ryan Ro
Trey Hydock
Callia Liang
Angelica She

Violoncello
Jeremy Cha + ’23
Bridget Denzer ’23
William Gu ’23
Katie Cappola ’23
Aaron Dantzler
William Robles
Brandon Cheng
Rachel Chen
Rebecca Cho
Matthew Kendall
Kaivalya Kulkarni
Aster Zhang
Andrew Do
Natalia Arbelaez-Solano ~

Contrabass
Ewan Curtis + ’23
Cara Turnbull
Abhi Bansal
Bernie Levenson
Jingwan Guo
Mitchell Goodman-Sprouse
Jack Hill

Flute and Piccolo
Annette Lee + ’23
Kate Park
Anna Solzhenitsyn
Alessandro Troncoso +
Alex Tsai + ’23
Audrey Yang

Oboe and English Horn
Jeremy Chen + ’23
Leon Chen ’23
Darren Chiu + ’23
Sarah Choi
Richard Huang ’23
Abigail Kim

Clarinets
Naomi Farkas
Daniel Kim
Kevin Mo +
Kyle Tsai +
Allison Yang + ’23

Bass Clarinet
Nirel Amoyaw

Bassoons
Taylor Akin + ’23
Annie Jain + ’23
Gabriel Levine + ’23
Christopher Li

Contrabassoon
Dirk Wels

French Horns
Soncera Ball +
Spencer Bauman
Jacob Beyer ’23
Clara Conatser
Benjamin Edelson + ’23
Selena Hostetler ’23
Ian Kim +
Sophia Varughese
Sada Harris

Trumpets
Gabriel Chalick +
Trevor Holmes + ’23
Helen Cueyoung Lee
Devon Ulrich + ’23
Coleman Yanagisawa

Trombones
Artha Abeysinghe
Jack Isaac + ’23
Johnathan Schubert

Euphonium
Sebastian Quiroga ’22 G’23

Tuba
Wesley Sanders

Harps
Leila Hudson
An-Ya Olson ’22 G’23

Timpani
Kerrie Liang
Andrew Tao
John Wallar

Percussion
Jake Klimek ~
Louis Larsen ~
Wonju Lee
Andrew Tao
John Wallar
Shivam Kak

Librarians
Dan Hudson

Orchestra Manager
Dan Hudson

Orchestra Committee
Co-Presidents
Rachel Chen
Aaron Dantzler
Treasurer
Artha Abeysinghe
Social Chairs
Andrew Liu
Audrey Yang
Publicity Chairs
Callia Liang
Wesley Sanders
Members at Large
Andi Grene
James Han
Abigail Kim
Haram Kim
Alumni Chair
Kelly Kim
Gear Chair
Spencer Bauman
Webmaster
James Han
Video Chair
Christopher Li