Violin Concerto (Tower)

Last updated
Violin Concerto
by Joan Tower
Commissioned by
Duration19 minutes
Movements1
Premiere
DateApril 24, 1992
Location Salt Lake City, Utah, U.S.
Conductor Joseph Silverstein
Performers Elmar Oliveira and the Utah Symphony

The Violin Concerto is a composition for solo violin and orchestra by the American composer Joan Tower. It was commissioned by the Barlow Endowment for Music Composition and the Snowbird Institute. The piece was first performed by the violinist Elmar Oliveira and the Utah Symphony under the conductor Joseph Silverstein on April 24, 1992, in Salt Lake City, Utah. It is dedicated to the violinist Elmar Oliveira. [1] [2] The composition was a finalist for the 1993 Pulitzer Prize for Music. [3]

Contents

Composition

The Violin Concerto has a duration of roughly 19 minutes and is composed in one continuous movement. Tower described the composition in the score program notes, writing:

It is really a fantasy for violin and orchestra exploring different kinds of feelings that range from a robust Romantic tune for orchestra to sharply etched rhythmic punctuations to a very soft passage that descends from the highest celestial reaches of the violin. There are two violin duets for soloist and concertmaster that were written as a tribute to Elmar’s brother (also a violinist and one of Elmar's teachers), who passed away in the fall of 1991. The last section is fast, and takes as its thematic basis a motive from Bartók’s Contrasts for clarinet, violin and piano, an idea that has frequently appeared in other of my works. [1]

Instrumentation

The work is scored for solo violin and an orchestra comprising two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets, trombone, timpani, two percussionists, and strings. [1]

Reception

The music critic Leslie Wright called the piece "well constructed and colorfully orchestrated." He added, "I found the concerto convincing overall, though the violin's fast, repetitive solos became a bit tiresome after a while." [4]

Related Research Articles

Ellen Taaffe Zwilich is an American composer, the first female composer to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music. Her early works are marked by atonal exploration, but by the late 1980s, she had shifted to a postmodernist, neoromantic style. She has been called "one of America's most frequently played and genuinely popular living composers." She was a 1994 inductee into the Florida Artists Hall of Fame. Zwilich has served as the Francis Eppes Distinguished Professor at Florida State University.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Violin Concerto (Beethoven)</span> Concerto composed by Beethoven in 1806

The Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 61, was written by Ludwig van Beethoven in 1806. Its first performance by Franz Clement was unsuccessful and for some decades the work languished in obscurity, until revived in 1844 by the then 12-year-old violinist Joseph Joachim with the orchestra of the London Philharmonic Society conducted by Felix Mendelssohn. Joachim would later claim it to be the "greatest" German violin concerto. Since then it has become one of the best-known and regularly performed violin concertos.

Shulamit Ran is an Israeli-American composer. She moved from Israel to New York City at 14, as a scholarship student at the Mannes College of Music. Her Symphony (1990) won her the Pulitzer Prize for Music. She was the second woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music, the first being Ellen Taaffe Zwilich in 1983. Ran was a professor of music composition at the University of Chicago from 1973 to 2015. She has performed as a pianist in Israel, Europe and the U.S., and her compositional works have been performed worldwide by a wide array of orchestras and chamber groups.

John Paul Corigliano Jr. is an American composer of contemporary classical music. With over 100 compositions, he has won accolades including a Pulitzer Prize, five Grammy Awards, Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition, and an Academy Award.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Henry Brant</span> American classical composer

Henry Dreyfuss Brant was a Canadian-born American composer. An expert orchestrator with a flair for experimentation, many of Brant's works featured spatialization techniques.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Joan Tower</span> American composer, concert pianist and conductor

Joan Tower is a Grammy-winning contemporary American composer, concert pianist and conductor. Lauded by The New Yorker as "one of the most successful woman composers of all time", her bold and energetic compositions have been performed in concert halls around the world. After gaining recognition for her first orchestral composition, Sequoia (1981), a tone poem which structurally depicts a giant tree from trunk to needles, she has gone on to compose a variety of instrumental works including Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman, which is something of a response to Aaron Copland's Fanfare for the Common Man, the Island Prelude, five string quartets, and an assortment of other tone poems. Tower was pianist and founding member of the Naumburg Award-winning Da Capo Chamber Players, which commissioned and premiered many of her early works, including her widely performed Petroushskates.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Grażyna Bacewicz</span> Polish musician (1909–1969)

Grażyna Bacewicz Biernacka was a Polish composer and violinist of Lithuanian origin. She is the second Polish female composer to have achieved national and international recognition, the first being Maria Szymanowska in the early 19th century.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Steven Stucky</span> American composer

Steven Edward Stucky was a Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer.

Joseph Clyde Schwantner is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer, educator and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters since 2002. He was awarded the 1970 Charles Ives Prize.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul Schoenfield</span> American composer

Paul Schoenfield, also spelled Paul Schoenfeld or Pinchas Schoenfeld, was born January 24, 1947, in Detroit, Michigan and died April 29, 2024, in Jerusalem, Israel. He was a classical composer and pianist known for combining popular, folk, and classical music forms.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Augusta Read Thomas</span> American composer (born 1964)

Augusta Read Thomas is an American composer and University Professor of Composition in the Department of Music at the University of Chicago, where she is also director of the Chicago Center for Contemporary Composition.

Jukka Santeri Tiensuu is a Finnish contemporary classical composer, harpsichordist, pianist and conductor.

Jennifer Higdon's Concerto for Violin and Orchestra was written in 2008. The work was jointly commissioned by the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, and the Curtis Institute of Music. It was composed for the violinist Hilary Hahn and was given its world premiere by Hahn and the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra under the conductor Mario Venzago on February 6, 2009. The piece was later awarded the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Music.

The Singing Rooms is a concerto for solo violin, choir, and orchestra by the American composer Jennifer Higdon. The work was jointly commissioned by the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, and the Minnesota Orchestra. It was first performed on January 17, 2008 in Philadelphia by the violinist Jennifer Koh, The Philadelphia Singers, and the Philadelphia Orchestra under the conductor Christoph Eschenbach. The text of the piece is set to poems by Jeanne Minahan. The piece was most recently done in March 2019 at the Kimmel Center for Performing Arts in Philadelphia by the Temple University Choirs and Orchestra, with a featured violin soloist.

Stroke is an orchestral composition by the American composer Joan Tower. The work was commissioned by the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and is dedicated to the composer's brother, who suffered from a debilitating stroke in 2008. It was first performed in Pittsburgh on May 13, 2011, by the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra under the conductor Manfred Honeck.

The Concerto for Orchestra is an orchestral composition by the American composer Joan Tower. The work was jointly commissioned by the St. Louis Symphony, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and the New York Philharmonic.

The Concerto for Clarinet is a composition for solo clarinet and orchestra by the American composer Joan Tower. The work was commissioned by the Walter W. Naumburg Foundation for the clarinetist Charles Neidich, to whom the piece is dedicated.

Astral Canticle is a double concerto for violin, flute, and orchestra by the American composer Augusta Read Thomas. The work was Thomas's sixth and final commission by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra before she concluded her nine-year tenure there as composer-in-residence. It was first performed in Chicago on June 1, 2006, by the flutist Mathieu Dufour, the violinist Robert Chen, and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under the conductor Daniel Barenboim. The piece is dedicated to Barenboim and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. The composition was a finalist for the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Music.

The Piano Concerto No. 3 is a composition for solo piano and orchestra by the American composer Peter Lieberson. The work was commissioned by the Minnesota Orchestra for the ensemble's centennial. It was given its world premiere by the pianist Peter Serkin and the Minnesota Orchestra in Minneapolis on November 26, 2003. The piece is dedicated to Peter Serkin and was a finalist for the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for Music.

Chamber Dance is a composition for orchestra written by the American composer Joan Tower. The work was commissioned by the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, to which it is dedicated. The piece was first performed by the same ensemble at Carnegie Hall on May 6, 2006.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Tower, Joan (1991). "Concerto for Violin". G. Schirmer Inc. Retrieved December 27, 2015.
  2. Goodfellow, William S. (April 19, 1992). "Joan Tower: 'Celestial-Like Tune' For Violin Will Premiere In S.L." Deseret News . Retrieved January 21, 2016.
  3. Shaw, David (April 14, 1993). "Times Wins a Pulitzer for Coverage of Riots: Journalism: Prize is for spot news. Miami Herald hurricane stories cited; Washington Post gets 3 awards". Los Angeles Times . Retrieved December 27, 2015.
  4. Wright, Leslie. "REVIEW: Tower Violin Concerto". Musicweb-International. Retrieved December 27, 2015.