Violin Concerto No. 1 (Shostakovich)
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The Violin Concerto No. 1 in A minor, Opus 77, was originally written by Dmitri Shostakovich in 1947 - 1948. He was still working on the piece at the time of the Zhdanov decree, and in the period following the composer's denunciation the work could not be performed. In the period between the work's initial completion and the first performance on 29 October 1955, the composer and its dedicatee, David Oistrakh, worked on a number of revisions. The work was finally premiered by the Leningrad Philharmonic under Yevgeny Mravinsky. It was well received, Oistrakh remarking on the "depth of its artistic content" and describing the violin part as a "pithy 'Shakespearian' role".
The work is scored for piccolo, three flutes, three oboes, cor anglais, three clarinets (3rd doubling bass clarinet), two bassoons, contrabassoon, four horns, tuba, timpani, tambourine, tam-tam, xylophone, celesta, two harps and strings.
The concerto lasts around 35 minutes and has four movements, with a cadenza linking the final two:
- Nocturne - A semi-homage to the first movement of Elgar's Cello Concerto.
- Scherzo - Demonic dance.
- Passacaglia - Utilizes Beethoven's fate motif, incorporating it into the pre-burlesque cadenza.
- Burlesque - The theme in the solo violin's entrance resembles that was the solo flute's entrance in Stravinsky's Petroushska.
Oistrakh characterised the first movement as "a suppression of feelings", and the second as "demoniac". The scherzo is also notable for an appearance by the DSCH motif representing the composer himself. Boris Schwarz (Music and Musical Life in Soviet Russia, 1972), commented on the passacaglia's "lapidary grandeur" and the burlesque's "devil-may-care abandonment". The beginning of the passacaglia is also notable for its juxtaposition of the invasion or Stalin theme from the Seventh Symphony and the fate motif from Beethoven's Fifth Symphony.
The concerto is sometimes numbered as Opus 99: the time-lag between composition and performance is the reason that it was originally issued as Opus 77 (Opus 77 was then allocated to Three Pieces for orchestra).
[edit] External Links
- Excerpts of Violin Concerto No. 1 [1]
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