Sinfonía de Antígona (Antigone Symphony) is Carlos Chávez's Symphony No. 1, composed in 1933. The music originated as theatre music to accompany the tragedy of Antigone, hence the title of the symphony. The material was reworked into a single movement and rescored for a large orchestra. It lasts about 11 minutes in performance.
Contents
History
The Sinfonía de Antígona originated from the incidental music Chávez composed for a production of Jean Cocteau's adaptation of Sophocles' tragedy Antigone, given by the group Teatro Orientación at the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City in 1932. Chávez re-shaped some of the musical materials and orchestrated the result as his First Symphony. It was premiered in Mexico City under the composer's baton on 15 December 1933 (Slonimsky 1945, 233–34; Orbón 1987c, 79). Two movements of the original theatre music, for a chamber ensemble of seven players, was eventually published by the composer's estate as Antígona, apuntes para la Sinfonía (Antigone, sketches for the Symphony) (Chávez 2000).
Instrumentation
The symphony is scored for piccolo, flute, alto flute, oboe, cor anglais, Heckelphone, E♭ clarinet, two clarinets, bass clarinet, three bassoons, eight horns, three trumpets, bass tuba, timpani, percussion (three players), two harps, and strings.
Analysis
Chávez employs a modal language consciously borrowed from the Ancient Greek musical system, in particular the Greek Dorian and Hypodorian, including the Dorian chromatic genus. The obsessive use throughout the symphony of the two consecutive semitones of this genus creates a ritual atmosphere (Orbón 1987b, 82). The rhythms sometimes employ 5/8 time, taken from the ancient Greek paeonic (or cretic) meter (García Morillo 1960, 76). The harmonic idiom employed by Chávez in this symphony systematically avoids conventional triads, replacing them with quartal harmonies generated by superimposing fourths (Orbón 1987b, 83).
Although there are no programmatic references, the music's bleak and austere character reflects the drama for which it was originally created. The sparse orchestration contributes to the remote strangeness of the music through unusual unison and octave doublings, such as piccolo, clarinet, and trumpet; piccolo and Heckelphone; and oboe, clarinet, and Heckelphone (Parker 1983, 69–70).