Hi friends! I’m thrilled to welcome back the lovely Riana Everly to Austenesque Reviews today! She has just released a new book that titled, Preludes: A Modern Persuasion Improvisation, and I think it is absolutely perfect! Combining two of my biggest passions – Jane Austen and Music! Also, it is a modern-day story! And I can never get enough of those!

Riana is here to share a fun and interactive post about the musical pieces featured in her novel. We hope you enjoy! 🎶

Let the Music Play

I am delighted to be wrapping up my little blog tour here at Austenesque Reviews. Thanks so much to Meredith for hosting me today. Meredith and I are both musicians, and my novel, Preludes: A Modern Persuasion Improvisation, is all about music, and so I thought I would talk about… music!

My new release is a modern interpretation of Jane Austen’s fabulous novel Persuasion, that quintessential tale of a second chance at love. It is my favourite of her novels, and I hope I did justice to it. I’ve set my story in present-day Toronto, Canada, in the world of classical music. Anne Elliot is a composer who has achieved international recognition, and Frederico Valore is the conductor every orchestra wants. They were a couple until a bitter break-up eight years ago, and haven’t seen each other since. But now Fred has been hired to conduct the orchestra that will première Anne’s first symphony, and they are forced to work together. Naturally, music takes centre stage in the novel. As a composer, Anne sees the world through a musical lens, and Fred’s bread and butter is the orchestral repertoire.

One aspect that always makes me a bit sad about Regency Austen adaptations is that the characters will never hear the fabulous music composed after their era. But in a modern version of the story, I can remedy that. From Bach to jazz to movie music, they enjoy everything that we can. I’ve had people ask me if I have a soundtrack or playlist in mind for this novel, and I do, in a sense. I’ll give you the list of pieces mentioned in Preludes, and talk just a bit about some of them.

Playlist

J.S. Bach – Brandenburg concertos

W.A. Mozart – String quartets (all of them. They’re wonderful)

G. Holst – The Planets

L. van Beethoven – Symphony #5

J. Brahms – Quintet for piano and strings, op.34

J. Brahms – Symphony #3

J.S. Bach – Sonata #4 for violin and harpsichord

W.A. Mozart – Violin Sonata No. 21, E Minor, K. 304

I have played most, but not all, of these pieces, and some I know much better than others.

Ludwig van Beethoven’s fabulous Fifth Symphony is probably the best known of these pieces. It is, arguably, the best piece of music ever written, although I’d be the first to offer other candidates. There are very few people who haven’t heard that famous Da-da-da-DUMMMMM theme that resonates in one form or another throughout the symphony.

At the risk of going all Music Professor on everyone, I’ll drop in links to just a couple of examples of this.

Here’s the main theme, from the very beginning.

If you listen to the entire first movement, this theme comes up again and again. But it doesn’t end there. Let’s look quickly at the second movement, where that same rhythmic pattern comes up in a much gentler form.

This is hardly it’s only appearance here. Take a listen and see how often Ludwig sneaks it in there.

The third movement is a scherzo, where the initial contemplative theme in the cellos is broken by –guess what—that same rhythmic pattern.

My favourite reappearance of the theme, however, comes at the link between the third and the fourth movements. This last movement also shifts from the more sombre key of C-minor to a glorious C-major, like the sun breaking through the clouds.

You can, of course, listen to the entire symphony. This is a nice recording, but there are plenty of lovely ones out there:

Johann Sebastian Bach wrote six instrumental works that he presented to the Margrave of Brandenburg-Schwedt in 1721, which collectively are known as his Brandenburg Concertos. They are all scored for different ensembles, and feature different instruments in the solo parts. The third of these is really a concerto for string orchestra, since there is one instrument given the “concerto” part. Instead, there are three violin parts, three viola parts, and three cello parts, and all the instruments take turns in the spotlight. This is a favourite piece for proficient student orchestras, and one that I’ve played many times. This recording features just one player on a part, which is likely how Bach envisioned it.

My favourite is the sixth of these concertos, with two solo viola parts, since this is my instrument. I’ve never performed it, but I have played it with friends.

Gustav Holst (1874-1934), despite his rather Germanic name, was an English composer born in Cheltenham to a family of musicians. His most famous piece is probably his seven-movement orchestral suite titled The Planets. The suite was written between 1914 and 1917, “a series of mood pictures,” in the composer’s own words. Each movement is named after a planet in the Solar System, with the musical material based on that planet’s supposed astrological character. For example, the first movement is “Mars, the Bringer of War,” and the fourth is “Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity.” In my novel, I talk a bit about Mars, with the percussive strings, bright martial brass, and its relentless 5/4 rhythm. You can listen to it here.

The music I wish I could talk about more is Anne Elliot’s music, Preludes, the piece that brought her to people’s attention, and her movie score to a fiction smash hit called The Butterfly’s Kiss. I’d love to find someone to compose some of this music for me. I, alas, do not have the skills to even contemplate what her music would sound like, but I know it’s wonderful.

Music, of course, is how Anne sees—or hears—the world, and every image might become part of one of her pieces.

Here is an excerpt from Preludes, where a bike ride through the countryside becomes music in her head.

She wrenched her attention back to the road and to the surrounding countryside. This was wine country. Field after field of vineyards surrounded them, the long straight vines sporting bright leaves and clusters of young grapes, broken up by orchards of tender fruit or tracts of hay and other farmland. There was something soothing and reassuring in the even spacing of the vines, like the regular harmonic progression of a Bach cantata, a walking bass line, predictable and comfortable, leading inexorably from tonic through a musical path back to the tonic.

But the leaves greening on their stems were something different again. Lush. Unpredictable. Growing where they wanted, a riot of life upon the carefully manicured vines. The exotic, free-flowing melody that crested and swept along, anchored by the harmony but not bound to it, moving where it would, twisting here and there, but always returning to its roots.

Later on in the novel, she has composed a short piece for the orchestra that draws on this experience. It also gives her and Fred a chance to—dare I say it?—make beautiful music together.

“I started scoring the second movement of Impressions. I hope you’ll like it, Fred. It’s based on that bike ride we did with Sophia and Jeremy last spring, just after you came back. The vines and the grapes and the river all called to me until I turned them into music. May I?”

She gestured to the piano. Both men nodded. Anne put down her plate and moved to the bench. She tried a few chords and, satisfied that the instrument was in tune and that the action of the keys was comfortable, she began to play. It was only a few bars, two or three minutes at most, but it would give the men a sense of her idea. The steady, regular progression of the staked vines, the riotous glorious abstract growth of lush leaves and fruit, the mighty and relentless press of the great Niagara River broken up with little waves and splashes upon its banks, all these were now notes and melodies and harmonic progressions, sometimes separate, sometimes layered, other times in counterpoint. She spoke up above her playing, explaining something here or there.

“This section will be brass, with a strong bass line… here I’m going to let the winds take the melody, with the strings con sordino and a whisper of tympany… I was thinking of solo cello here, with commentary from the English horn and bassoon….”

She finished and returned to her seat, then went to refill her plate.

“Bravo, Anne. I can hear exactly what you mean. It will be terrific.” Fred’s words were warm and genuine. Ben just sat there with a goofy smile on his face.

“I am in awe. I knew you were famous, but now I’ve realised what rarified company I’m keeping. Fabulous!” He took a sip of his beer. “What’s that solo cello part again, Anne?” he asked. “Do you have the music for that?”

She pulled out her tablet and called up the program she used. She handed it to him.

“Oh, not me, dear. I can’t read a note other than Middle C, and then only if it’s circled in red with an arrow pointing to it. Show it to our friend here. He bashes that great ugly guitar from time to time.” He winked and looked over at the cello.

Fred took the tablet and hummed a couple of notes, his fingers moving up and down as he did so, pulling phantom music from the air. Then he took the tablet to the music stand beside the piano and picked up the cello and settled it between his knees. He tightened the bow and plucked the strings. It was in tune with the piano. He must have played it earlier today.

He put the bow on the strings and in a moment the room was filled with the lush sounds of the instrument, chocolate and velvet, the reddish-tinted tones of the notes a perfect complement to the wood and green of his decor. Anne had forgotten how gifted he was. Had he not taken up the baton, he could have had a good career on the concert stage as a cellist.

“Play with him, Annie,” Ben invited. It sounded like an acceptable idea, and she did so, joining him with the murmuring undercurrent of harmony, punctuated by the contrapuntal comments from the cor anglais and bassoon lines.

Are you a music lover? What is your favourite piece of music? Let me know in the comments.

This post was amazing, Riana! Thank you!! It brought back wonderful memories of being in Music History class, which was one of my favorites! I do agree about Beethoven’s Fifth, it is a masterpiece. I love that there is so music to discover and enjoy in Preludes. I can’t wait to read it! 🎧

And to answer your question – my favorite piece is one that I feel fated connection with – Rachmaninov’s Prelude in C sharp minor. 🎹

~~~

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~ Author Riana ~

Award-winning author Riana Everly was born in South Africa but has called Canada home since she was eight years old. She has a Master’s degree in Medieval Studies and is trained as a classical musician, specialising in Baroque and early Classical music. She first encountered Jane Austen when her father handed her a copy of Emma at age 11, and has never looked back.

Riana now lives in Toronto with her family. When she is not writing, she can often be found playing string quartets with friends, biking around the beautiful province of Ontario with her husband, trying to improve her photography, thinking about what to make for dinner, and, of course, reading!

 

GIVEAWAY TIME!!!

In conjunction with her visit, Riana is giving away an ebook copy of Preludes: A Modern Persuasion Improvisation to 1️⃣ lucky reader!

To enter this giveaway leave a question, comment, or some love for Riana!

• This giveaway is open worldwide.  Thank you, Riana!
• This giveaway ends October 25th! (make haste, friends!)