PROGRAM NOTES
by Dr. Richard E. Rodda

Suite from Billy the Kid
Aaron Copland (1900-1990)

Composed in 1938.
Premiered on October 16, 1938 in Chicago.

Soon after Copland met Lincoln Kirstein, director of the American Ballet Caravan, the adventurous predecessor of the New York City Ballet, in the late 1930s, Kirstein commissioned him to write a ballet about Billy the Kid, the notorious outlaw of the Old West famed in ballad and legend. Alfred Frankenstein, a noted critic and the long-time program annotator for the San Francisco Symphony, wrote of the factual Billy the Kid, “His real name was William Bonney. He was born in New York City in 1859, but grew up in Silver City, New Mexico, where his mother kept a boarding house. He murdered his first man in a saloon in Silver City when he was twelve years old, and for the next nineteen years was one of the most industrious and generally admired bandits of the Southwest. Eventually he was captured, tried for murder, and condemned to death. He made a sensational escape from the sheriff’s deputies, but one day he was shot down by Pat Garrett, a sheriff, who was once his friend.”

The score is prefaced by Copland’s synopsis of the ballet’s plot: “The action begins and closes on the open prairie. The central portion of the ballet concerns itself with the significant moments in the life of Billy the Kid. The first scene is a street in a frontier town. Familiar figures amble by. Cowboys saunter into town, some on horseback, others with their lassoes. Some Mexican women do a Jarabe which is interrupted by a fight between two drunks. Attracted by the gathering crowd, Billy is seen for the first time as a boy of twelve with his mother. The brawl turns ugly, guns are drawn, and in some unaccountable way, Billy’s mother is killed. Without an instant’s hesitation, in cold fury, Billy draws a knife from his cowhand’s sheath and stabs his mother’s slayers. His famous career has begun. In swift succession we see episodes from Billy’s later life. At night, under the stars, in a quiet card game with his outlaw friends. Hunted by a posse led by his former friend Pat Garrett. Billy is pursued. A running gun battle ensues. Billy is captured. A drunken celebration takes place. Billy in prison is, of course, followed by one of Billy’s legendary escapes. Tired and worn in the desert, Billy rests with his girl. Starting from a deep sleep, he senses movement in the shadows. The posse has finally caught up with him. It is the end.”

The concert suite that Copland arranged soon after the ballet’s 1938 premiere — The Open Prairie, Street in a Frontier Town, Card Game at Night, Gun Battle, Celebration after Billy’s Capture and a reprise of The Open Prairie — contains about two-thirds of the complete score.

MORE NOTES ON THIS PROGRAM

FORTNER - Fantasma (World Premiere)
GERSHWIN - Variations on "I've Got Rhythm"
ADAMS - The Chairman Dances
CRESTON - Symphony No. 2
GERSHWIN - Rhapsody in Blue

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