Violin Concerto (Barber)
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Samuel Barber completed his Violin Concerto, Op. 14, in 1939. It is a work in three movements, lasting about 22 minutes.
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[edit] History
In 1939 Philadelphia industrialist Samuel Fels commissioned Barber to write a violin concerto for Fels' adopted son, Iso Briselli, who had graduated from the Curtis Institute of Music the same year as Barber (1934). Barber accepted his advance and went to Switzerland to work on the concerto. The first two movements were presented to Briselli who was disappointed in the lack of virtuosic displays. Subsequently, following a delay of about 1 year, Barber delivered the third movement, a brilliant perpetuum mobile, which Briselli declared unplayable and no match for the quality or substance of the first two movements. He tried to persuade Barber to expand it, and give it a more defined structure. Barber declined. At that point, Fels asked for his advance to be returned. Barber answered that he had spent the money on his composing trip to Switzerland. Barber had the work played at Curtis to show Briselli that third movement was playable. The work was not premiered by Briselli, but he did play it privately in later years; Barber and Briselli remained friends, although there are many contradictory accounts of their relationship.
Ralph Berkowitz, at that time the Curtis Institute's staff pianist, found a young violin student, Herbert Baumel, in the Curtis Common Room. Baumel was known to be an excellent sight reader, and Berkowitz asked Baumel to study the finale for a couple of hours, then to join him in pianist Josef Hofmann's studio. After reviewing the music, Baumel went to the studio to discover an audience of Barber (now teaching at Curtis), Gian Carlo Menotti, Mary Louise Curtis Bok (founder of the Curtis Institute), and a friend of Mrs. Bok.
Herbert Baumel performed the concerto in the 1939–1940 season as soloist with the symphony orchestra of the Curtis Institute, conducted by Fritz Reiner. That performance brought the piece to the attention of Eugene Ormandy, who soon scheduled its official premiere in a pair of performances by Albert Spalding with the Philadelphia Orchestra in the Academy of Music in February 1941. [The actual premiere was on February 7.] Those performances were followed on February 11, 1941, by a repeat performance in Carnegie Hall, and from that point, the piece rapidly entered the standard violin and orchestral repertoire. In fact, the Barber Violin Concerto has become one of the most frequently performed of all twentieth-century concertos.
[edit] Recordings
The concerto has been recorded by a number of violinists, including Anne Akiko Meyers, Joshua Bell, James Ehnes, Hilary Hahn, Itzhak Perlman, Gil Shaham and Isaac Stern. The version made in 1964 by Stern with the New York Philharmonic conducted by Leonard Bernstein remains a celebrated romantic interpretation, while the 1988 recording by Meyers with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra has been highly praised. A transcription of the concerto for flute and orchestra has also been recorded on the Regis label with Jennifer Stinton as the soloist.
[edit] Form of the Work
- Allegro
- Andante
- Presto in moto perpetuo
Barber provided these program notes for the premiere performance:
- The first movement — allegro molto moderato — begins with a lyrical first subject announced at once by the solo violin, without any orchestral introduction. This movement as a whole has perhaps more the character of a sonata than concerto form. The second movement — andante sostenuto — is introduced by an extended oboe solo. The violin enters with a contrasting and rhapsodic theme, after which it repeats the oboe melody of the beginning. The last movement, a perpetuum mobile, exploits the more brilliant and virtuosic character of the violin.
The concerto is scored for two each of flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns, and trumpets, timpani, snare drum, piano, and strings.
[edit] External links
- Anne Akiko Meyers performs the Barber Violin Concerto
- Composer's Gamble
- Redwood Symphony Program Notes
- Rochester Philharmonic Program Notes
- An in-depth portrayal of the violinist linked to this violin concerto
- A detailed discography of Barber's works, including various versions of the Violin Concerto
[edit] References
- The Strad magazine - November 1995 (Barber's Violin Concerto: The True Story)
