Servais - Concerto Militaire, Op. 18 (Urtext Edition, Piano Version)

Servais composed three concertos for cello and orchestra, as well as the Morceau de Concert, which is identified as Concerto No. 2 in the autograph. The Concerto militaire was the last of his concertos to be published during his lifetime. It was dedicated to King William III, Guillaume III, of the Netherlands, a royal dedicatee who also received works by other major nineteenth-century composers, including David Popper’s Polonaise, Op. 14, Henri Vieuxtemps’s Cello Concerto No. 1, and Ambroise Thomas’s opera Le songe d’une nuit d’été.

The concerto belongs to the “military concerto” subgenre that developed after the French Revolution. Works in this tradition typically include two or three march-like movements, depending on whether the slow movement takes the form of a funeral march, and often call for an expanded percussion section, including instruments such as snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, and triangle. Related examples include Offenbach’s Concerto militaire and Romberg’s Sixth Cello Concerto. Servais’s work combines this martial character with the brilliant cello writing, lyrical contrast, and theatrical pacing characteristic of his concert music.

In the G-major section of the Rondo, Servais reuses a theme from his Souvenir d’Anvers. This edition is based on the first edition for cello and piano, published by Schott in February 1861. The orchestral version was also consulted, and additional fingerings found in the cello cue line of the piano score have been incorporated into the main text where appropriate. The sources were graciously provided by the Servais Society.

ASTA Level: 6