Le Mozart Noir (Joseph Boulogne) - Reviving a Legend

the year is 1793 the french revolution has collapsed into chaos and one of france's greatest musicians is jail the son of a slave the chevalier de san george rose to become one of france's most popular heroes but here in prison the legacy of a man who has been called the mozart noir will be lost to history george is a man of remarkable achievements europe's greatest fencer a renowned violinist and a composer who influenced mozart tragically his music will not be heard for another 200 years [Music] he as a character is a mystifying alluring just a bigger than life kind of human being i mean most people are astonished when i tell them there is a composer who happens to be black during the time of mozart people are people are surprised there uh there can't possibly be there's no doubt about it that the parisian public adored him at the time he was exotic he was one of the best violinists they had and he turned paris into the mecca of symphony i'm interested in san george and i'm discovering that other musicians in other parts of the world are interested in sound shorts at the same moment something is happening astrologically or i don't know what it is that can account for that but there's a certain style in the air there's a certain spirit musical spirit in the air [Music] so [Music] [Applause] [Applause] [Music] do [Music] [Applause] so awaits his calling to the guillotine such a moment as death would befit the epic life that this remarkable outsider has lived the story of classical music's first black composer begins a continent away [Music] was born in guadalupe on christmas day 1745 to a rich colonialist and his slave mistress the belong family fortune is founded on sugar coffee and the labor of african slaves saint george's prospects in guadalupe are meager because the law prevents mulattos from owning land so the father a minor aristocrat makes a bold decision to take his slave mistress and mulattosan to paris in hopes of turning him into a french gentleman the relationship between saint george's father and him there was just a real attachment between him and his son he may have just found it impossible not to take it take him with him he may have just adored him the main gist i think the main trust of the father's ambition for the boy was to see whether he could get him into society young saint george arrives in paris as the age of enlightenment is dawning his father hopes to offer his son a freer life in an international cultural capital however these aspirations face the prevailing attitudes in france which see blacks as servants and laborers the most contemptuous attitudes see blacks as animals without souls in a time when the slave trade is still rampant and lucrative being somehow between two worlds one of which is being the lowest social strata slaves and the other one in a higher social strata the aristocrats this must have made him very insecure fencing is the sport of the aristocracy and a ticket into society george is enrolled by his father in la boissiere's prestigious academy of fencing at 13 years old young sajjor seizes the opportunity to prove himself [Music] a disciplined and model student he devotes countless hours to training developing his talent to an extent that dazzles everyone including la boissiere's son who writes at the head of all my father's students must be placed the inimitable saint george at 15 he was beating the strongest fighters at 17 he acquired the greatest speed he astonished with his agility and he never hurt anyone but saint george's reputation as a great fencer raises the ire of many whites and he receives challenges from across europe actually we have a kind of a proof of his father's ambition for him and how he pushed him and that is the incident when another fencing master by the name of picard started sending messages to paris saying that he wanted to fight bracies mulatto which was pejoratively used by him at that time hurt by bicar's racial condescension saint george is unwilling to accept such an ignoble challenge but his father persuades him that every fight is a chance to prove his worth and preserve his honor [Music] so [Music] saint george defeats pika but mindful of challenges to come he returns with renewed focus to the hours of solitary training to further saint george's aristocratic education his father employs the great composers of paris gosek to teach his son to play the violin with this turn to music sanjors discovers his calling he devotes himself completely to mastering the violin his technique was extraordinary almost as if the virtuoso fencer transferred his right hand technique with the sword to to the ball each year san george's teacher cossec organizes special concerts featuring the best musicians from across france united in one orchestra called les concer des he invites saint george to play first violin it is a daring choice saint georges is an anomaly in the white world of high society concert music but he is not intimidated and his performances are virtuosic the young violinist is rewarded with an enthusiastic reception from parisian audiences i really believe that him being a mulatto in in a white society made him work harder towards being recognized sanjores quickly masters the contemporary repertoire inspired he turns to composition as a new way to challenge himself he becomes passionate about discovering the limits of the violin and how far they can be pushed way that he wrote his music is so indicative of somebody who's like i gotta be number one i gotta be up there he's uh his writing is very virtuosic it's clear that he could get around the instrument very easily and had no technical limitations whatsoever in any regard saint george's virtuosic experiments on the violin lead him to discover the instrument's potential to spar against the orchestra in new more aggressive ways the result is a dynamic new form of music the symphony concertant which is legendarily challenging for performers when you play the concertos of saint george you're not going to have a walk in the park you're going to you're going to sweat a little bit even even in some modern repertoire i've never played quite as high on the fingerboard i mean what is it [Music] i mean i'm way up there he keeps shooting you up there and then immediately back down so i had to figure out how to do that oftentimes your your hands will be uh you know like this or or or you'll be asked to to do all these different things and come up with all sorts of interesting bowing [Music] this is exciting for the audience ah it's exciting for me [Laughter] there was like about four measures that were just going to break me or every night i kind of went like oh my god am i going to get it tonight [Music] bye [Music] [Applause] me [Music] [Applause] [Music] my uh [Music] [Music] um [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] the way that saint george used the bow and the technique and the effects that he produced must have surprised mozart when he was in paris because we know that when he went back from paris he wrote one of the greatest works the symphony concerto in e flat a major for violin and viola and there we know that there is an influence directly from saint george because there is a passage which is very uncomfortable because virtuosically is difficult which towards the end of mozart's symphony concertante in e flat sounds like this and the st george concerto opus 5 number 2 has a passage that in e major goes you see there is a difference it's half a tone higher mozart's in a flat and he's in e major but they're identical and they're not typical passages used at the time saint george's performances gain him celebrity in european high society in 1773 he is appointed to direct gosex it is a triumph for this ambitious outsider the doors to the ruling class are opened and saint george makes himself a fixture in the courts of the aristocracy he is even invited to versailles and plays with the queen marie antoinette sanjores begins to win a reputation among society women for his exotic looks and growing fame their courtship of saint george makes him believe that he might truly become one of their own saint george obviously was a great lover this man was a ladies man i think he was a serious serious ladies man he certainly had his share of love affairs it seems he seems to have seduced everybody's wife all the prominent noblemen of the time his liaisons with with women uh probably gave him uh a lot of satisfaction in more race than one uh but he was unmarriageable as far as european society was concerned not being able to get married must have been a source of undeniable sorrow for him not being able to have someone that would even consider you for a long-term uh relationship for all his achievements sanjors has yet to find a true love amongst the women of parisian society until he meets the young marie joseph wife of the old general montelemba [Music] [Applause] [Music] so [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] bye [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] so [Music] you [Music] foreign [Music] so marie joseph becomes saint george's one great love and according to two neighbors who were writing gossip journal at the time their diaries mention the fact that there seemed to have been a baby which the general did not accept as his own for sanjors having a son out of wedlock with a woman he loves is like reliving his parents romance he would have the same hopes for this new baby that his father had had for him [Music] when his son was born it must have obviously it it gave him the the image of the possibility of being a father it never happened on the orders of maurizio's husband the wet nurse neglects the baby and lets it die [Music] the second movement of the concerto really felt like he was having an emotional response to some event in his life it really touched me like in my gut somehow it just really pulled something out of me that i hadn't expected actually to experience with his music what i love about the second movement of the violin concerto is again the simplicity of the elements that he uses if you listen to the violas and this and the second violins and the the opening is just [Music] one note [Music] that kind of thing and on top of this melody [Music] just tender size what could be simpler three notes and one note in the accompaniment and yet it's so moving and this is what a great composer does great composer takes one note or one very simple element like and builds on it and somehow it touches you more deeply than something very complex and convoluted it's it's like great poetry or something we're just just the right word and it might be a very familiar word but it's when where and how that makes all the difference [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] me [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] so [Music] in 1776 sanjorja's career is still on the rise he sets his sights on the most prestigious musical position in france director of the paris opera it is a symbol of national culture the hollywood of its day teeming with prestige and allure and gossip leads a group of entrepreneurs who are bidding from control of the opera house word spreads through paris that sanjor's acclaimed talent makes him the king's favorite choice however when members of the opera company hear that saint georges will be the new director there is an immediate reaction [Music] the opera's three leading divas are powerful women and they quickly assemble a petition to send to the queen they write our owner and the delicate nature of our conscience could never allow us to submit to the orders of a mulatto it is the most public racial humiliation of his life he was denied that job in fact no one got the job at that point there was no one else qualified to it wasn't as if there were two qualified people and they took the white man there was in fact no one else qualified at that moment in time which must have made it even twice as painful they took no one but saint george while i'm sure he spent days perhaps weeks in seclusion not seeing anyone was not discouraged about his ambitions in writing opera because he went on to write six or seven sanjors continues composing concertos too still supported by important patrons he commissions franz joseph haydn to write what will become the paris symphonies saint georges has the honor of conducting their world premiere the successes of saint george lead him to the court of the duke de leon here saint george finds a new friendship with the duke's son philippe who will take san george's life in a surprising new direction politics philippe is a liberal aristocrat who invites sanjors to join the reform movement which promises democracy equality and an end to racial discrimination and slavery in france george has spent a lifetime hiding his slave lineage so it is a difficult decision for him to join the fight for reform over time however he becomes a convert philippe takes saint george on a trip to london england where the anti-slavery movement is far ahead of france there he is vetted as a celebrity but most importantly he meets with leaders of the anti-slavery movement and is inspired by their belief in abolition his eyes are open to the possibility of fighting for others of african descent who have not been granted his opportunities he returns with philippe to france invigorated by the culture of reform however the reform movement has begun to erupt into revolution [Applause] [Music] [Applause] when pressures for reform failed to topple the monarchy's power the people of france take up arms and force the king to abdicate a new republic is born with a new people's government and a new role for sanjors that he never could have imagined monarchist forces in austria germany and spain allies of the deposed king attack the new government must raise an army to defend the republic they turn to saint-george the composer and invite him to become sanjors the soldier he's famous for his swordsmanship but has never been to war he has navigated the treacheries of high society but has no tactical skills for the battlefield he's asked to lead a battalion it is a daunting task as an artist he could avoid the front line but in the belief of emancipation he commits his life to battle [Music] black men in france rallied to the summons of the country's most famous he raises a regiment a thousand soldiers strong the sanjor's legion [Applause] he leads his men heroically in battles that repulse the austrian invasion sanjor should be acclaimed a war hero but the revolution plunges into chaos the fledgling democracy is strangled by warring factions by panic and suspicion [Music] the king is executed the reign of terror begins but the guillotine is not just for the king it is ready for anyone with ties to the upper classes and that includes saint george [Music] sanjores has spent his life committed to the hopes of his father using every talent to pursue a place among the aristocracy but now in 1793 these former ambitions are his death sentence [Applause] [Music] arrested imprisoned he awaits execution saint george's close friend and mentor philippe de leon eager to distance himself from the aristocracy changes his name to philippe equality [Music] but under the reign of terror nothing can protect him from his faith while sanjors deposed leader of the black battalion is in prison the french government abolishes slavery still believing himself a part of the revolution sanjores furiously petitions the citizens council from prison in this one of his only surviving [Music] letters citizen director i have constantly demonstrated my loyalty to the revolution i have served it with a tireless zeal undiminished by the persecutions i have suffered i have no other recourse but that of being reinstated in my rank of soldier i address myself to your sense of justice he signs his name simply george his plea is refused one by one his friends are washed away in blood the society he once knew is no more his music now associated with a decadent age he's drained of respect and drifts into obscurity how much of his music is left is a very good question what we have now is about a third of it i don't think there's a hope of finding all of it i'm sure some of it just simply got burned in some building in the french revolution or something and just is no more i think black children need to know that there was a great composer in the european style i think we all need to know that i think that whether the kids be asian or caucasian or what have you jewish i don't care but he certainly is an important enough person as a composer a poor important enough person as a character of history that i think that's criminal to submerge him beneath the waves of history it is important i think that that's an important aspect that it wasn't just the white guy who was being supported by royalty and making this this this kind of music the arts belong to all of us whatever color or sex or religion we are it belongs to all of us as a performer i think my job is to play the music get it out there get people to know the story and to appreciate the music and to be curious because once people are curious about the music that creates a demand and then somebody will have to do this publication won't they so it's just to promote it it's to to exposure as much as possible i'm hopeful that the music of saint george now enters into the concert scene and that we don't lose track of this again [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] in 1794 sanjorja spared execution by benevolent commissioner he lives his remaining years as a commoner abandoning his earlier ambitions and playing with small orchestras at 54 he dies unmarried my favorite part in saint george wow okay [Music] [Applause] [Music] hmm [Music] daddy [Music] free great [Music] you

Channel: Lovecraft and the Mozart Noir

Views: 28,950

Keywords:

Id: jSJ66Q0Ua7s

Length: 52min 59sec (3179 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 30 2021