Performed by The Toledo Symphony on January 16 & 17, 2026 at The Valentine Theatre

J.S. Bach (1685–1750)
Brandenburg Concerto No. 6 in B-flat Major, BWV 1051 

J. S. Bach became Kapellmeister in Cöthen in 1717, a position he held until 1723. In addition to this position, he also composed music for the court of Prince Leopold. During these years, Bach concentrated primarily on secular instrumental music (as opposed to his output during the immediately preceding years in Weimar). In relation to the entirety of Bach’s compositional output, the time he spent at Cöthen was among the most productive for instrumental music, and he composed, among other works, the Six Sonatas [and Partitas] for solo violin, the Well-Tempered Clavier (v. 1), and the six Brandenburg Concerti. 

In 1719, Bach traveled to Berlin to take possession of a new harpsichord that was being built for the court at Cöthen. While he was there, he met the Margrave Christian Ludwig of Brandenburg, who invited him to send along some new compositions. Bach had started several concertos in 1717 during his time in Weimar, but it was a further two years before he completed his “Six concerts avec plusieurs instruments” (six concertos with several instruments).  

Bach sent the completed scores to the Margrave in 1721 with the following dedication: “As I had a couple of years ago the pleasure of appearing before Your Royal Highness ... and as I noticed then that Your Highness took some pleasure in the small talents that Heaven has given me for Music, and as in taking leave of Your Royal Highness, Your Highness deigned to honor me with the command to send Your Highness some pieces of my composition: I have then in accordance with Your Highness’s most gracious orders taken the liberty of rendering my most humble duty to Your Royal Highness with the present Concertos, which I have adapted to several instruments.” 

In his six Brandenburg concertos, Bach followed the concerto gross formal structure established by Corelli and Vivaldi. This form features a small solo group, called the concertino, performing with a larger ensemble, called the ripieno or tutti. The concertos are in three movements, following the fast-slow-fast structure.  

Bach varies the instrumentation within the six concertos, and the sixth calls for strings and continuo only. Moreover, he focuses on darker colors by not including any violins. The concertino for Brandenburg Concerto No. 6 calls for two solo violas, originally called violas da braccio (held by the arms), two violas da gamba (held by the legs and now usually replaced by cello), and cello.  

The first movement is contrapuntal, with the two violas in canon separated by only an eighth note (half a beat). The second movement is slower, ends unresolved, and moves almost directly into the final Allegro.  

There is no mention of the Margrave ever performing any of the Brandenburg concertos, paying Bach, or even responding to his letter. Musicologist Jane Vial Jaffe notes that this may be because the Margrave didn’t have the necessary instrumental resources at his disposal. She writes, “It is certainly true that Bach used unprecedented and different scoring in each of the individual works, treating the collection like an ‘Art of the Concerto Grosso’ and thus was not aiming to match any specific establishment’s resources.” Eventually, the score became property of the state and moved to a Berlin library, until it was finally published in the mid-nineteenth century during the revival of Bach’s music. The Brandenburg Concertos have been hugely popular ever since.  

Igor Stravinsky (1882–1971) 
Pulcinella Suite 

Igor Stravinsky’s work extends across a large part of the twentieth century and includes works in many genres within classical music. The project that evolved into Pulcinella was first suggested by the impresario Serge Diaghilev (with whom Stravinsky had collaborated on The Rite of Spring, The Firebird, and Petruschka) in 1919 as a ballet based on Pergolesi’s music. At first, Stravinsky refused, as he did not, at that time, anyway, like Pergolesi’s music! It is likely that Stravinsky would have been most familiar with Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater, but perhaps not too many of Pergolesi’s other pieces, but when Diaghilev showed him some less well-known pieces – Stravinsky found these more to his liking and agreed to the project. 

Scored for only thirty-three players and three vocalists, Pulcinella is a work on a much smaller scale than Stravinsky’s previous collaborations with Diaghilev. The whole event came together rapidly, with Pablo Picasso designing the sets. The first production was a great success, despite some initial minor altercations between the principal dancers. 

Pulcinella is quite an important work in Stravinsky’s compositional output, as it is the first in his second main compositional period, during which he focused on works in the neoclassical style. “Neoclassicism” can mean slightly different things depending on the medium of the work, but in music, neoclassicism refers to the composer’s effort to return to one or more classical ideal – ideals such as simplicity, structural symmetry, purity, classical forms, and tonality. 

Stravinsky’s neoclassicism has proven difficult to describe, however, mostly because scholars have difficulty agreeing on which characteristics of his work are intentionally neoclassical. Author Martha Hyde describes his work as “accommodating” the past – an elegant way of explaining it – although Milan Kundera, who studied Stravinsky’s music extensively, calls Stravinsky’s forays into a neoclassical style an attempt to heal the “pain of estrangement” caused by his forced emigration. Kundera explains that for an artist, this alienation of that which was once familiar causes a rift between the “understructure of creativity … formed in youth” and the creative adult self. He infers that “Stravinsky’s neoclassical style [was] a metaphorical recognition – and achievement – of a new home with the ‘classics’ of European music … [and] he did all he could to feel at home there … [examining everything from] the music of … Pergolesi to [that of] Tchaikovsky, Bach, Perotin, Monteverdi … in which he recognized yet another room in his home.” 

Stravinsky himself describes his neoclassical work as more of a compulsively “rare form of kleptomania” in which he appropriates characteristics and materials from earlier composers and remakes as his own. His works, however, engage with these earlier classical pieces in a much more general way than merely being “music in the style of” Haydn or Mozart. What is important is not that the piece he chose as his model was a classic (it became so partly because Stravinsky chose it) but the remaining points of difference between the model and the finished work. While neoclassicism implies a wish to bring back an earlier style, it is also something neo, new, creating itself by veering from the classicism it is modeled on. 

Pulcinella is not only based on borrowed styles but also on borrowed music. Stravinsky’s source is a set of pieces by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi (1710–1736) and comes from two of his opere buffe and a few instrumental pieces. Barring the use of ragtime music in the dance movements of Stravinsky’s L’Histoire du Soldat (1918), Pulcinella is the first major work to such an extent based on preexisting material. 

Musicologist Jonathan Cross describes the relationship between work and source material: “In one sense, the imitation proceeds as if it were reverently transcribing a hallowed text, but nonetheless adorns it with modern affectations.” It is true that Stravinsky leaves most of the “borrowed” music intact, merely rearranging it with a more contemporary flare. Cross further describes Stravinsky’s treatment of Pergolesi’s work as “resembl[ing] an elegant gloss more than an original composition.” The sparkling transparent textures and general tightening of the rhythms are characteristic of Stravinsky’s work. 

Some musicologists also argue that because Stravinsky has done very little in the way of disrupting Pergolesi’s tonality, Pulcinella does not constitute a real example of neoclassicism. Despite keeping most of the tonal structure intact, Stravinsky does add a lot of contemporary ornamental figures, light dissonances, and asymmetrical or adjusted phrase lengths. However, the majority of Pergolesi’s time signatures remain intact. 

Throughout Pulcinella, many of the melodies are linked or related. For example, the main melody in the Minuet is melodically related to that in the Tarantella, even though the sources are from different composers! Stravinsky thought that all the source material was by Pergolesi, but while Pergolesi wrote the Minuet (it is from the Canzona out of his Lo grate ’nnamorato), the Tarantella is from a piece by composer Van Wassenaer. Stravinsky slightly modified the melodies in order to connect them more securely (the Minuet was originally meant to follow the Tarantella). 

The concert suite is an arrangement of the original ballet music, which Stravinsky orchestrated himself, choosing eleven of the original eighteen movements and replacing the sections requiring vocalists with instrumental solos. It’s as a suite that the work became so popular – helped also by its version as the Suite Italienne for violin and piano. 

The story of Pulcinella is a well-known one from Neopolitan commedia dell’arte. The hero, young Pulcinella, has stolen the hearts of all the local girls. Understandably, this upsets their fiancés, who decide to kill Pulcinella. Pulcinella is clever, though, and escapes by sending his double to meet them. This double only pretends to be dead, later to be revived by Pulcinella, who is in disguise. Thinking Pulcinella dead, the fiancés dress as him and visit their own sweethearts. Pulcinella then reappears on stage and arranges weddings for everyone, including his own, to Pimpinella. 

Giovanni Battista Pergolesi (1710–1736) 
Sinfonia from La Salustia 

A contemporary of both Bach and Handel, Giovanni Battista Pergolesi was born in Jesi, Italy, and received his musical education in Naples. He is most known for his vocal music and is not a regular in the concert hall, partly because his untimely death from tuberculosis means his repertoire is relatively small. However, he occupies an important place in music history, helping to bridge the gap between true Baroque opera and more Classical works.  

Pergolesi composed La Salustia when he was just 21 years old, and it is his first real stage work. The libretto is from poet and playwright Apostolo Zeno’s Alessandro Severo, which tells the story of the Roman Emperor Alessandro Severo’s wife, the Empress Salustia. In Zeno’s version, Salustia is tormented by Alessandro’s horrible mother Giulia, who manipulates him into removing Salustia from the throne and disowning her. Giulia then takes her place as Empress, causing Salustia’s father Marziano to plot various methods of revenge. Regardless of her treatment at Giulia’s hands, Salustia heroically defends her mother-in-law from all her father’s attempts to assassinate her. The story ends as well as possible, with hope for the future.  

Pergolesi ran into difficulties before the premiere of La Salustia. First, the castrato who was supposed to sing the role of Marziano died suddenly, and there was no satisfactory backup. A far less experienced singer was required to step in, but this along with some other last-minute changes to casting necessitated a fair amount of frantic rewriting on Pergolesi’s part.  

La Salustia was finally premiered in 1732 and was not very successful. More recently, it’s been performed twice in the last two decades at the festival held in Jesi in Pergolesi’s honor.  

George Frideric Handel (1685–1759) 
Water Music 

Originally from Halle in central Germany, George Frideric Handel first visited London in 1710, when he was appointed to the position of Kapellmeister to the Elector of Hanover. Two years later, he settled there permanently, finding his Italian operas to be extremely popular in Britain. His position in England was further confirmed when the Elector, his employer, became King George I, making Handel his first court composer.  

King George I is somewhat famous for his river parties, which lasted for hours and featured lavish food and entertainment. A newspaper article from July 1717 reported that at around 8 o’clock in the evening, the king “took to the water at Whitehall in an open barge ... and went up the river towards Chelsea. Many other barges [carrying] Persons of Quality attended.” Friedrich Bonet of Brandenburg, who was one of these “persons of quality.” “Next to the King’s barge was that of the musicians, about 50 in number, who played on all kinds of instruments, to wit trumpets, horns, hautboys [oboes], bassoon, German flutes [transverse flutes], French flutes [recorders], violins, and basses; but there were no singers.” The news article outlined the time frame of the festivities: “the finest Symphonies [were performed from the musicians’ barge], composed express for this Occasion, by Mr. Hendel; which his Majesty liked so well, that he caused it to be plaid over three times ... At Eleven his Majesty went a-shore at Chelsea, where a Supper was prepar’d, and then there was another very fine Consort of Musick, which lasted till 2 [A.M.]; after which, his Majesty came again into his Barge, and return’s the same way, the Musick continuing to play till he landed [after 4 A.M.].” Bonet adds, “The evening was all that could be desired for the festivity [presumably referring to the weather], and the number of barges and above all of boats filled with people wanting to listen was beyond counting.”  

Though these “finest Symphonies” are generally assumed to be Handel’s Water Music, the autograph manuscript was lost. Water Music is a collection of three suites that share neither key nor instrumentation. The G-major suite is scored for flute, recorder, and strings. It is light in texture and possibly intended for the indoor portion of the celebration to be performed during dinner.  

The F-major and D-major suites both include brass instruments and a larger orchestra, presumably for the outdoor portion, where they would carry easily across the water. The F-major suite, also called the “Horn Suite”, is the first piece in England to include the horn as a full and equal member of the orchestra. Earlier works generally relegated the horn to a coloristic role in order to recall hunting horns. (Incidentally, Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 1, composed in the same decade, also uses horns.) Handel’s F-major suite was also performed in an earlier version two years prior, for an earlier party. Two movements from this version are gone now, having been reworked to include trumpets and included in the D-major “Trumpet Suite” instead. 

In creating new compositions, Handel often borrowed from his older works and from the works of others. This was a fairly common practice at the time, and no doubt also facilitated the speedy completion of new pieces. Handel lifted material more gracefully than most and usually managed to improve them in some way.  

Harpsichordist Charlotte Nediger notes that King George’s river parties were “regular occurrences during the summer season ... [and these] royal excursions were important social occasions.” Having his Water Music performed so publicly (and repeatedly) absolutely helped Handel gain even more popularity, and many subsequent concerts featured his music. Water Music remains extremely popular today.