Violin Concerto (Khachaturian)

Last updated
Violin Concerto
by Aram Khachaturian
Key D minor
Composed1940 (1940)
Performed16 November 1940 (1940-11-16)
Movements3

Aram Khachaturian's Violin Concerto in D minor is a violin concerto in three movements composed in 1940. It was composed for David Oistrakh and was premiered on 16 November 1940 by Oistrakh. [1] [2]

Contents

Composition

In 1940, Khachaturian was enjoying tremendous professional success and personal joy. [3] He worked on the concerto in the tranquility of a wood composer's retreat west of Moscow; he said of the composition that he "worked without effort ... Themes came to me in such abundance that I had a hard time putting them in order." [4] Many sections of the concerto are reminiscent of the folk music of Khachaturian's native Armenia—while he never directly quotes a specific folk melody, "the exotic Oriental flavor of Armenian scales and melodies and the captivating rhythmic diversity of dances" are throughout the work. [3] The work has been charactered by "an exhilarating rhythmic drive and vitality, and a penchant for intoxicating, highly flavored, languorous melody owing much to the inflections of his native Armenian folk music." [5] Having won the Stalin prize in 1941, it has since become one of Khachaturian's famous pieces, in spite of considerable criticism. [6]

Structure

Violin concerto in D minor (1940)

A movement in sonata form, the Allegro con fermezza opens with a melody that has been described as "energetic" [4] a "rollicking dance-like theme," [5] and this yields to a "more lyrical" [5] secondary melody.

The Andante sostenuto has been described as "a rhapsodic slow movement that sweeps one into a brooding wintry landscape." [5] Geoffrey Norris wrote, "The ease and spontaneity, pungency and flexibility of Khachaturian's melodic inventions are most clearly laid out in the Andante sostenuto of the central movement, cast in a free-flowing, quasi-improvisatory manner redolent of the art of Armenian folk music." [4] The second movement is a free-flowing rondo. [7]

The concluding Allegro vivace has been called "a whirlwind of motion and virtuosity." [5] In this movement, "the folks element is specially pronounced in the dance-like vigor of the main melody and in the repetitive, insistent, wild virtuosity of the solo instrument." [4]

Transcriptions

When flautist Jean-Pierre Rampal approached Khachaturian to ask him to compose a concerto for flute and orchestra, Khachaturian suggested that the Violin Concerto would be adaptable for flute. With the composer's encouragement, Rampal completed the transcription in 1968, providing his own cadenza as a substitute for the original violin cadenza in the first movement. The orchestral accompaniment throughout the Concerto remains unchanged. [8] [9]

Discography

YearSoloistConductorOrchestra
1946 David Oistrakh Alexander Gauk USSR State Symphony Orchestra
1947 Gerhard Taschner Artur Rother Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra
1951 Leonid Kogan Aram Khachaturian USSR State Radio Symphony Orchestra
1954 David Oistrakh Aram Khachaturian Philharmonia Orchestra
1955 Ruth Posselt Richard Burgin Boston Symphony Orchestra
1956 Igor Oistrakh Eugene Aynsley Goossens Philharmonia Orchestra
1956 Ruggiero Ricci Anatole Fistoulari London Philharmonic Orchestra (stereo)
1958 Leonid Kogan Pierre Monteux Boston Symphony Orchestra
1959 Mischa Elman Vladimir Golschmann Vienna State Opera Orchestra
1962 Ida Haendel Hans Müller-Kray Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra
1963 Aldo Ferraresi Aram Khachaturian Orchestra Sinfonica RAI Turin
1964 Henryk Szeryng Antal Doráti London Symphony Orchestra
1964 Jean Ter-Merguerian Michael Maluntsian Armenian Philharmonic Orchestra
1967 David Oistrakh Aram Khachaturian Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra
1981 Boris Gutnikov Konstantin Ivanov USSR Large Symphony Orchestra
1984 Itzhak Perlman Zubin Mehta Israel Philharmonic Orchestra
1989 Valery Klimov Evgeni Svetlanov USSR Academy Symphony Orchestra
1990 Lydia Mordkovitch Neeme Järvi Royal Scottish National Orchestra
2001Mihaela Martin Theodore Kuchar National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine
2003 Arabella Steinbacher Sakari Oramo City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra
2003 Sergey Khachatryan Emmanuel Krivine Sinfonia Varsovia
2004 Julia Fischer Yakov Kreizberg Russian National Orchestra
2007 Aaron Rosand Kees Bakels Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra
2007 Catherine Manoukian Eduard Topchjan Armenian Philharmonic Orchestra
2008 Nicolas Koeckert José Serebrier Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
2010 Ara Malikian Jesús Amigo Extremadura Symphony Orchestra
2011 Mikhail Simonyan Kristjan Järvi London Symphony Orchestra
2014 James Ehnes Mark Wigglesworth Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
2016 Philippe Quint Steven Sloane Bochumer Symphoniker
2018 Nemanja Radulović Sascha Goetzel Borusan Istanbul Philharmonic Orchestra
2019 Rachel Barton Pine Teddy Abrams Royal Scottish National Orchestra
2020 Antje Weithaas Daniel Raiskin Staatsorchester Rheinische Philharmonie
YearFlute SoloistConductorOrchestra
1970 Jean-Pierre Rampal Jean Martinon Orchestre National de France
1984 James Galway Myung-whun Chung Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
1992 Patrick Gallois Ion Marin Philharmonia Orchestra
2002 Emmanuel Pahud David Zinman Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich
2004 Wissam Boustany Volodymyr Sirenko National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine
2010 Sharon Bezaly Enrique Diemecke São Paulo State Symphony Orchestra

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aram Khachaturian</span> Soviet Armenian composer (1903–1978)

Aram Ilyich Khachaturian was a Soviet Armenian composer and conductor. He is considered one of the leading Soviet composers.

The Violin Concerto by Arnold Schoenberg dates from Schoenberg's time in the United States, where he had moved in 1933 to escape Nazi Germany. The piece was written in 1936, the same year as the String Quartet No. 4. At the time of its completion, Schoenberg was living in Brentwood, Los Angeles, and had just accepted a teaching position at the University of California, Los Angeles. The work is dedicated to Anton Webern.

The Violin Concerto No. 1 in A minor, Op. 77, was originally composed by Dmitri Shostakovich in 1947–48. He was still working on the piece at the time of the Zhdanov Doctrine, and it could not be performed in the period following the composer's denunciation. In the time between the work's initial completion and the first performance, the composer, sometimes with the collaboration of its dedicatee, David Oistrakh, worked on several revisions. The concerto was finally premiered by the Leningrad Philharmonic under Yevgeny Mravinsky on 29 October 1955. It was well-received, Oistrakh remarking on the "depth of its artistic content" and describing the violin part as a "pithy 'Shakespearian' role."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Violin Concerto (Mendelssohn)</span> 1844 composition by Felix Mendelssohn

Felix Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in E minor, Op. 64, MWV O 14, is his last concerto. Well received at its premiere, it has remained among the most prominent and highly-regarded violin concertos. It holds a central place in the violin repertoire and has developed a reputation as an essential concerto for all aspiring concert violinists to master, and usually one of the first Romantic era concertos they learn. A typical performance lasts just under half an hour.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Piano Concerto No. 21 (Mozart)</span>

The Piano Concerto No. 21 in C major, K. 467, was completed on 9 March 1785 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, four weeks after the completion of the previous D minor concerto, K. 466.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Violin Concerto No. 3 (Mozart)</span> Violin concerto by W. A. Mozart

The Violin Concerto No. 3 in G major, K. 216, was composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in Salzburg in 1775 when he was 19 years old. In a letter to his father, Mozart called it the "Straßburg-Concert". Researchers believe this epithet comes from the motive in the third movement's Allegretto in the central section, a local dance that already had appeared as a musette-imitating tune in a symphony by Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alexander Arutiunian</span> Armenian composer, pianist

Alexander Grigori Arutiunian, was a Soviet and Armenian composer and pianist, widely known for his 1950 Trumpet Concerto. A professor at Yerevan State Conservatory, he was recognized with many awards for his work, including the Stalin Prize in 1949 and People's Artist of the USSR in 1970, as well as numerous honors from his homeland of Armenia.

Béla Bartók's Violin Concerto No. 1, Sz. 36, BB 48a was written in the years 1907–1908, but only published in 1956, 11 years after the composer's death, as "Violin Concerto No. 1, Op. posth." It was premiered on 30 May 1958 in Basel, Switzerland.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Violin Concerto (Glazunov)</span>

The Violin Concerto in A minor, Op. 82, by Alexander Glazunov is one of his most popular compositions. Written in 1904, the concerto was dedicated to violinist Leopold Auer, who gave the first performance at a Russian Musical Society concert in Saint Petersburg on 15 February 1905. The British premiere of the concerto followed just over a year later, under the direction of Sir Henry Wood and with Mischa Elman as soloist. The American premiere of the work was not until 27 October 1911. It was performed by Efrem Zimbalist at his American debut with the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Piano Concerto No. 18 (Mozart)</span> 1784 composition by W. A. Mozart

The Piano Concerto No. 18 in B major, K. 456, is a piano concerto by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. In Mozart's own catalogue of his works, this concerto is dated 30 September 1784.

Aram Khachaturian's Piano Concerto in D-flat major, Op. 38, was composed in 1936. It was his first work to bring him recognition in the West, and it immediately entered the repertoire of many notable pianists.

Antonín Dvořák wrote his String Quartet No. 10 in E major, Op. 51 (B. 92), in 1879 at the request of Jean Becker, the leader of the Florentine Quartet. It is sometimes nicknamed the Slavonic Quartet. The quartet was dedicated to Jean Becker; it was first performed by the Joachim Quartet at a private chamber music evening on July 29, 1879, in Berlin. It was published by Simrock, Berlin, in 1879.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Violin Sonata (Shostakovich)</span> 1968 sonata for violin and piano by Dmitri Shostakovich

Dmitri Shostakovich composed his Sonata for Violin and Piano in G major, Op. 134 in the autumn of 1968 in Moscow, completing it on October 23. It is set in three movements and lasts approximately 31 minutes. It is dedicated to the violinist David Oistrakh, who premiered the work on May 3, 1969 in the Large Hall of the Moscow Conservatory.

Aram Khachaturian wrote his Cello Concerto in E minor in 1946 for Sviatoslav Knushevitsky. It was the last of the three concertos he wrote for the individual members of a renowned Soviet piano trio that performed together from 1941 until 1963. The others were: the Piano Concerto for Lev Oborin (1936); and the Violin Concerto for David Oistrakh (1940).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Violin Sonata No. 2 (Brahms)</span>

The Violin Sonata No. 2 in A major, Op. 100, by Johannes Brahms was written while spending the summer of 1886 in Thun in the Bernese Oberland, Switzerland.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Symphony No. 2 (Khachaturian)</span>

The Symphony No. 2 in E minor, is one of the Armenian composer Aram Khachaturian's most well-known pieces of music. Completed in 1943, it was nicknamed The Bell or Symphony with Bells by Georgi Khubov for its bell motif that begins and ends the piece. A typical performance lasts about 50 minutes.

The Hungarian composer György Ligeti published three string quartets: two string quartets proper and a student piece from 1950 published toward the end of his life. The first two quartets represent his early period, inspired by Béla Bartók, and middle period, which was largely micropolyphonic.

<i>Tafelmusik</i> (Telemann) Collection of instrumental compositions by Georg Philipp Telemann

Tafelmusik is a collection of instrumental compositions by Georg Philipp Telemann (1681–1767), published in 1733. The original title is Musique de table. The work is one of Telemann's most widely known compositions; it is the climax and at the same time one of the last examples of courtly table music.

References

  1. Khachaturian: Violin Concerto / Concerto-Rhapsody (Naxos 8.555919) Liner Notes
  2. Khachaturian: Violin Concerto / Concerto-Rhapsody for Violin and Orchestra (Naxos 8.570988) Liner Notes
  3. 1 2 "BeavertonSymphony.org :: program notes Khachaturian Violin Concerto". beavertonsymphony.org.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Khachaturian, Violin Concerto, EMI CDC 7 47087 2, CD liner notes by Geoffrey Norris
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 "KHACHATURIAN violin concerto, Concerto-Rhapsody Naxos 8.555919 [RB][KS]: Classical CD Reviews- May 2004 MusicWeb(UK)". www.musicweb-international.com.
  6. "Aram Khachaturian Violin Concerto + Dimitri Shostakovich String Quartets". 17 October 2014.
  7. "Error | Kennedy Center".
  8. flute4u.com
  9. violamusicplus.com