Dahlia Nazir Neniel

Greg Dean Peterson

Classical Style and Romantic Spirits
23 October 2016

The Witching Hour: A Concerto For Eight Double Basses And Orchestra By Elena KatsChernin

The Witching Hour: A Concerto for eight Double Basses and Orchestra by Elena KatsChernin is piece that was commissioned by the Australian World Orchestra, composed by
Uzbekistan-born composer, Elena Kats-Chernin. The piece is based of the famous Russian
fairytale, Vasilisa the Beautiful - a story about a girl named Vasilisa and her trial versus the
evil witch Baba Yaga. The piece is divided into four movements; Spectres in the Forest, The
Wooden Doll Awakens, Elegy, and Vasilisa the Beautiful. The Witching Hour is a program
music, with programme notes provided by the composer.
In the first movement, Spectres in the Forest, the orchestra begins with a slow start,
with the celesta and harp. As Vasilisa gets lost and is come face-to-face with ghouls and
spirits, the music quickly transfigures into a fusion of syncopated and exuberant rhythms,
with the eight double basses playing through leaps and runs, with electrifying glissandos as
the ghouls and spirits manifest.
The doll that was given to Vasilisa by her dying mother comes to life for the first time
in the second movement. The piece begins with the oboe, playing a beautiful melody,
followed by the clarinet in a canon style. The double basses enters with such a scurrying and
busy melody, breaking the beautiful melody played by the winds. This movement reveals the
personality of the doll - a grand and fleeting waltz, with hints of mischievous thrown in, with
the soloists leading. As the music relaxes, the double basses play a solemn yet loving melody,

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in a canon style, and as it progresses the sound of knocking can be heard from the distance the knocking is coming from the hitting on the body of the double bass.
In the third movement, the piece begins with the timpani striking a single note, and the
double basses enters with a slow solemn melody, in a minor key, depicting the moment when
Vasilisa and her father are struck by a unbearable sorrow when Vasilisas mother passes away.
In this movement, Kats-Chernin uses the full extent of the Double Basss wide range; from its
low range to its high range. In this movement, the soloists are playing a perfect fourth above
the lowest note, with unisons with the woodwinds, creating a beautiful and rich sound.
In the final movement, confronted and challenged by Baba Yaga, the evil witch, Vasilisa
has to perform a series of tasks. The piece begins with the pizzicato of the strings, which then
grows more clamorous and warlike. As the piece climaxes, Vasilisa triumphs and the piece
shifts away from the minor keys and into the major keys.
Although written in the twenty-first century, The Witching Hour has elements from the
Romantic Era; fantasy, eternal feminine, personal feelings and nature. The entirety of the
piece, the setting is set in the forest, where Vasilisa lived with her two stepsisters and her
stepmother. The concept of eternal feminine is with Vasilisa, as she is not only beautiful but
she is depicted as angelic and attracts men from a far, is graceful and modest. The piece may
not have depicted the personal feelings of the composer, instead it described the personal
feelings of the characters in the piece - Vasilisa and her father when her mother passes in the
third movement, and the magical doll awakening in the second movement.

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