Flight of the bumblebee (Rimski-Korsakow)
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The Flight of the Bumblebee is an orchestral interlude from the third act of the opera Das Märchen vom Tsar Saltan by Nikolai Rimski-Korsakow from 1899/1900. It is one of those pieces of popular romantic music that are known worldwide and exist in numerous arrangements , instrumentations and transcriptions . The piece is popular with virtuoso musicians and orchestras as an encore at concerts.
background
The Russian composer Rimsky-Korsakov owes his fame mainly to his orchestral works, in particular the flight of the bumblebee from the opera mentioned. In this opera, rarely performed in the West, based on a libretto by Vladimir Bjelski based on a fairy tale by Alexander Pushkin , the enchanted Prince Gwidon , who has been transformed into a bumblebee , silences two evil sisters with deliberate stitches.
Musical structure
Characteristic of the Flight of the Bumblebee , the virtuoso composer is onomatopoeia , which is in the form of chromatic set sixteenth notes in 2/4- clock attracts almost the entire piece, and the consistently high tempo Vivace (lively). The metronome is given as 
= 180, so the quarter note should be played in 180 beats per minute. Mathematically, this means 720 sixteenth notes for 60 seconds, i.e. 12 tones per second.
The Flight of the Bumblebee is written in the key of A minor and extends over 113 bars in the original version for the opera. In addition, Rimsky-Korsakov has published a suite with instrumental pieces from his opera, in which the flight of the bumblebee was instrumented much more extensively and expanded with a few bars. Here the flight takes about three minutes and 20 seconds. The chromatic opening motif in this suite is first played by the flutes and violins, later the clarinets, horns and other wind instruments alternately take up the theme up to a strong tutti , after which the dynamics weaken significantly at the end . Rimsky-Korsakov uses the compositional technique of leitmotiv in his operas, as was widespread back then . Two leitmotifs accompany Prince Gwidon, who has been transformed into a bumblebee, on his flight. The first, chromatically changed, appears immediately after the opening chord, the second occurs first in bar 45.
Involvement in the plot
The Schwanenvogel fairy fulfills Gwidon's wish to invisibly follow a departing ship by letting it go into the sea and transforming it into a bumblebee. Immediately afterwards she invites him (as a bumblebee) to the famous bumblebee flight with the following song :
| Original Russian text | translation to German |
|---|---|
|
(Гвидон спускается с берега в море. Из моря вылетает шмель, кружась около Лебедь-Птицы.) ЛЕБЕДЬ-ПТИЦА: |
(Gwidon descends from the bank into the sea. A bumblebee comes flying out of the sea and circles the swan bird.)
Schwanenvogel: |
Arrangements and interpretations
Several composers arranged the flight of the bumblebee . Paul Siguir wrote a version for piano and oboe in 1929. Sergej Rachmaninoff transcribed the piece for piano solo in 1931. György Cziffra arranged a highly virtuoso piano version.
For some time, musicians have been trying to play the flight of the bumblebee faster and faster, for example the violinist Ben Lee , who played the piece in 64.21 seconds in 2010 and is thus listed in the Guinness Book of Records . The violinist David Garrett had previously held the record with 65.25 seconds. The fastest bumblebee flight was played by the Dresden tuba player Jörg Wachsmuth with 53.82s, faster than the record on the violin.
The pianist Lang Lang interpreted the piece in 2010 as an encore for a concert in San Francisco on an iPad .
The flight of the bumblebee was also picked up by rock musicians and in the metal music genre . There are interpretations by the bands Europe , Anvil (under the title Flight of the Bumble Beast on the album Strength of Steel ), Manowar (under the title Sting of the Bumblebee on Kings of Metal ) and Dream Theater (as part of a solo on Once in a LIVEtime ). It was used as a sample in Michael Jackson's song Breaking News .
Audio sample
(The flight of the bumblebee can be heard here in a shortened version for string orchestra compared to the orchestral suite, played by an orchestra of the US Army)
Individual evidence
- ^ Recording of the flight of the bumblebee in the version as a suite, played by the Scottish National Orchestra under the direction of Neeme Järvi
- ↑ W. Bessel & Co (В. Бессель и Ко): Das Märchen vom Tsar Saltan , piano reduction , St. Petersburg 1901, p. 159 ff. (Russian / German)
- ↑ website imslp
- ↑ Ben Lee from FUSE Break Official Violin World Speed Record in: prlog.org of August 7, 2010, accessed April 24, 2012
- ↑ Report on the record attempt in "Die Welt"
- ^ Report on the record with the tuba from August 17th, 2013 on rp-online.de
- ↑ CNET News website