Concert Vadim Repin (violin) and Itamar Golan (piano). Claude Debussy "Sonata". Igor Stravinsky "Divertissement". Ludwig van Beethoven "Sonata No 9" World famous Mariinsky Ballet and Opera Theatre - Opera and Concert Hall
Schedule for Vadim Repin (violin) and Itamar Golan (piano). Claude Debussy "Sonata". Igor Stravinsky "Divertissement". Ludwig van Beethoven "Sonata No 9" 2022
Composer: Igor Stravinsky Composer: Ludwig Van Beethoven Composer: Claude Debussy Violin soloist: Vadim Repin Piano: Itamar Golan
Orchestra: Mariinsky Theatre Symphony Orchestra
Vadim Repin (violin) and Itamar Golan (piano)
The programme includes: Claude Debussy Sonata Igor Stravinsky
Divertissement Ludwig van Beethoven Sonata No
9
Repin has a full tone and makes his instrument sing like an operatic
star, but his grandeur has nothing worldly or simply ceremonial about it...
Robert Giddings. The Tribune
The
Violin and Piano Sonata is one of Claude Debussy’s last works.
At various times in his life he planned numerous violin works, though he
completed very few, among them the Sonata on which he worked in 1916 – 1917. In
September 1917 Debussy performed the Sonata in an ensemble together with Gaston
Poulet. This premiere was his last public appearance. The airy, weightless
structure, the myriad flageolets in the violin part and the whimsical changes in
tempo imbue the music with an ephemeral quality that is rarely to be found, even
in works by impressionist composers. The three sections (Allegro vivo, Intermиde
and Finale) have no programme titles, although the music conjures up an entire
kaleidoscope of associations with earlier programme works by Debussy, and a
spectre from the fourth movement of Rimsky-Korsakov’s Schйhйrazade
hovers invisibly in the finale. But this time the composer preferred not to
reveal the meaning and left the riddle without any clue. Perhaps because the
contemporary painting that had inspired the composer from his young years had
become abstract before his very eyes.
Igor Stravinsky’s Divertissement for Violin and Piano is an
original arrangement of fragments from his allegorical ballet Le Baiser de
la fйe. The ballet was composed in the summer of 1928 following a
commission from the ballerina Ida Rubinstein. The libretto was based on tales by
Hans Christian Andersen. To a large degree, the music was based on themes from
works by Tchaikovsky. The idea of a ballet in the style of Tchaikovsky belonged
to Alexandre Benois, the artist who designed the production. Even the selection
of romances and piano pieces used by Stravinsky was made by the artist. The
premiere of the ballet Le Baiser de la fйe took place on
27 November 1928 at the Opйra de Paris and it was conducted by Stravinsky.
And on 4 November 1934 he conducted the Paris premiere of his
Divertissement for Orchestra, composed from highlights from the ballet. During
this period, Stravinsky performed on stage a great deal, and he was in urgent
need of a new concert repertoire. The Divertissement has four sections:
Symphony, Swiss Dances, Scherzo and Pas de Deux. At the same time, still in
1934, Stravinsky reworked the Divertissement for Violin and Piano.
Anna Bulycheva
Itamar Golan truly captivates audiences with his playing and in the
auditorium he creates an incredibly intense atmosphere. Golan is a virtuoso in
the finest sense of the word, utterly dedicated to music and an absolute
professional. BBC Music Magazine
Ludwig van Beethoven’s Sonata for Violin and Piano No 9 in A
Major, Op. 47, entered history under the title of the “Kreutzer
Sonata”, in as much as the composer dedicated it to French violinist Rodolphe
Kreutzer, of whose performing and human traits he had an extremely high opinion.
The addressee, however, had no opinion whatever of Beethoven’s music, and never
performed it once. The Sonata’s premiere in 1803 was exotic in nature: the piano
part was performed by the composer himself and the violin by the then renowned
virtuoso mulatto Bridgetower, the son of a Negro who claimed to be an Abyssinian
prince. Beethoven gave the work the sub-heading “in a very concert style” –
he would have been fully justified in calling it “in symphonic style”, as the
grandiose first section creates the impression of the movement of a symphony,
turning the duo of performers into a breathtaking “one-on-one”, demanding all
the resources of both instruments. The second part – an Andante with variations
– is again a competition, albeit of an entirely different nature: the violin and
the piano contend for supremacy over one another in subtlety and brilliance of
drawing, in a light, soaring movement weaving together the delicate musical
fabric. The finale of the Sonata is an impetuous tarantella, where there reigns
a joyful mood, the spirit of dance and humour. The popularity of the Kreutzer
Sonata was aided by Tolstoy’s tale of the same name; here the writer calls the
Andante “beautiful, though ordinary, not new”, the variations “vulgar” and the
finale “utterly weak”. However, of the first section he wrote that “These things
can be played only in famous, important and significant circumstances and only
at a time when renowned, famous steps must be taken, which correspond to this
music.” Later Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy changed his unflattering opinion of the
second and third parts. From pianist Goldenweiser’s Talks with Tolstoy
we know how the author lost his head on hearing the Sonata some years later
after publication of his tale. Seemingly, he himself could hardly believe in
that which he had once ascribed to this music.
Nadezhda Kulygina
Schedule for Vadim Repin (violin) and Itamar Golan (piano). Claude Debussy "Sonata". Igor Stravinsky "Divertissement". Ludwig van Beethoven "Sonata No 9" 2022
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