Tahiti Trot

History#

In his memoirs, Nicolai Malko recalled first hearing Vincent Youmans’ “Tea for Two” at the Meyerhold Theatre in Moscow in 1927: They performed a play called Roar, China. In one of the scenes some Americans on a ship are dancing. The foxtrot used in that scene became very popular. Nobody knew who the composer was. … It was called the “Tahiti Trot”. In reality it was “Tea for Two”. Jazz music was regarded very negatively in Russia in those days. I did not agree with this philosophy and referred to that foxtrot as an example of music that was not bad. Shostakovich developed an interest in popular music during this period. Like Malko, he had heard “Tea for Two” at the Meyerhold Theatre. He was also greatly impressed by Ernst Krenek’s jazz-influenced opera, Jonny spielt auf, and its arrangement of another Youmans song from No, No, Nanette, “I Want to Be Happy”. In the company of friends he enjoyed playing jazz-style improvisations on the piano for them. At some point before October 1927, Malko jokingly suggested to Shostakovich that he should orchestrate “Tea for Two” and proposed a bet: If you, Mitenka, are as brilliant as they all say, then please go into the next room, write that song down from memory, orchestrate it, and I will play it. I will give you an hour to do this. Shostakovich completed his task in forty-five minutes, thereby winning the bet. He dedicated the score to Malko as a “token of his best feelings”.

Music#

The manuscript score has no tempo markings; these were added by Gennady Rozhdestvensky when he edited the score for its first publication in 1984. A typical performance takes four minutes.

Instrumentation#

In the original arrangement, the orchestra consists of the following instruments: ;Woodwinds :2 flutes (2nd doubling piccolo) :2 oboes :1 clarinet :1 bassoon ;Brass :4 French horns :2 trumpets :1 trombone ;Percussion :timpani :triangle :tambourine :snare drum :cymbals :glockenspiel :xylophone ;Keyboards :celesta ;Strings :harp :1st violins :2nd violins :violas :cellos :double basses Shostakovich later adjusted the orchestration for the version of Tahiti Trot in The Golden Age and added a woodblock and alto saxophone.

Premieres#

Tahiti Trot was officially premiered at the Large Hall of the Moscow Conservatory on November 25, 1928, by the conducted by Malko, although this had been preceded by his performances on August 2 and 3 with the Baku Academic Orchestra in the Azerbaijani SSR. Prior to that performance, Malko told the Daily Mail that he did not make distinctions between a “great symphony” or a “musical comedy” provided that they are good, and that he appreciated a “good jazz band as much as a good symphony orchestra and far prefer ed to listen to a really good jazz band than a poor symphony orchestra”.

Retraction and loss#

The popularity of foxtrots and light music in the Soviet Union was viewed as a “problem” by the authorities. At a June 1929 conference of the Central Committee of the CPSU, People’s Commissar of Education Anatol Lunacharsky said that no task was “more urgent” for Soviet culture than to rebuke the “aggressive, jazzy syncopations of the foxtrot”: The bourgeoisie would like man to live not so much by his head as by his sexual organs. … The fundamental element of the foxtrot derives from mechanization, suppressed eroticism, and a desire to deaden feeling through drugs. … W e do not need that kind of music. Shostakovich repudiated Tahiti Trot in a 1930 issue of Proletarskiy Muzikant, the house journal of the Russian Association of Proletarian Musicians. He said that composing the arrangement and letting Malko perform it had been a “political mistake”, that he had conceived it for The Golden Age and that playing outside the context of the ballet gave the incorrect impression that he was a supporter of light music, and that he dispatched a letter to Malko immediately demanding that he cease performing Tahiti Trot. A later issue of Proletarskiy Muzikant published Malko’s response, which said that he never received any demand to stop performing Tahiti Trot, but that he had not programmed it in any of his recent concerts anyway. He also expressed irritation that Shostakovich had seemingly put the entire blame for the affair on him. In an afterword, the editorial board of the magazine wrote that both composer and conductor shared equal responsibility. The score was withdrawn and quickly forgotten, an outcome that Gauk deplored in his memoirs. By 1942, the manuscript was reported lost by Nicolas Slonimsky, although Malko confirmed in his memoirs that he still possessed it.

Reconstruction#

Gennady Rozhdestvensky reconstructed Tahiti Trot using the original orchestral parts that had been in the possession of Malko. His widow provided them to Rozhdestvensky. Tahiti Trot was published for the first time in 1984.

External links#

• Boosey and Hawkes webpage for the score
• Gennady Rozhdestvensky conducting Tahiti Trot in the orchestration for The Golden Age