Gil Shaham world premieres, 1930s concertos, and more
From new commissions and neglected rarities to repertory staples, Avery Fisher Prize-winner Gil Shaham demonstrates his singular versatility over the coming months. Late April sees the master violinist – Musical America’s Instrumentalist of the Year – undertake the world premiere of Kaddish (2011), a new violin concerto by Richard Danielpour, for three dates with the New Jersey Symphony. With his enviable flair for multi-tasking, Shaham couples the new commission with Berg’s Violin Concerto (1935), one of the many “Violin Concertos of the 1930s” foregrounded by his celebrated programming project of that name. Others include Stravinsky’s (1931), which he performs with Zurich’s Tonhalle-Orchester in May, and Hartmann’s less familiar Concerto funèbre (1939), for which the violinist joins the Bavarian State Orchestra and Kent Nagano in June. A second world premiere, of Julian Milone’s In the country of lost things…, forms the centerpiece of Shaham’s European recital tour this May, alongside signature works by Sarasate and Bach. And he revisits another of his favorite classics – Mozart’s Fifth Concerto (“Turkish”) – for the second of two upcoming collaborations with long-term musical partners Michael Tilson Thomas and the London Symphony Orchestra.
Guggenheim Fellow Richard Danielpour (b. 1956) composed Kaddish to honor his dead father; of its original arrangement for chamber ensemble, the New York Times reported: “Named for a Jewish prayer recited in memory of the dead,…the work captures and magnifies the prayer’s essence by juxtaposing an intricate, glancingly modal solo violin line and rhythmically steady, sometimes forceful ensemble writing.” For his world premiere performances of Kaddish in its new incarnation for violin and orchestra, Shaham pairs the concerto with another elegiac example of the genre, also composed as a memorial; Berg’s Violin Concerto (“To the Memory of an Angel”) was written shortly before the composer died, to commemorate the untimely death of Alma Mahler’s teenage daughter. When Shaham performed Berg’s masterpiece at the San Francisco Symphony, the San Francisco Chronicle marveled:
“The remarkable blend of acerbity and tenderness…that is Berg’s stylistic fingerprint found expression in Shaham’s full-throated, assertive string tone and aggressive rhythmic edge. He leaped fearlessly into the concerto’s most dissonant writing, giving it a polished sheen that never detracted from its essential difficulty or the emotional urgency that it imparts.”
At the New Jersey Symphony (April 27–29), the two concertos anchor a thematically cohesive program conducted by the orchestra’s Music Director, Jacques Lacombe.
Berg’s is one of the many concertos showcased by Shaham’s long-term exploration of iconic “Violin Concertos of the 1930s.” Conceived when he realized just how many of his favorite 20th-century violin concertos had been written in the 1930s, the project – now well into its third season – was recently hailed by Musical America as “one of the most imaginative programming concepts in years.”
The tumultuous political events of the 1930s sometimes had a direct impact on the concertos’ composition, notably in the case of Germany’s Karl Amadeus Hartmann, an idealist socialist whose Concerto funèbre was written in 1939 to protest Hitler’s occupation of Prague. After a recent account of the work with the New York Philharmonic, the New York Times observed: “Shaham played the solo line with a warm, focused, but never overly pretty tone, and perfectly characterized the work’s anguished and occasionally angry (in the assertive movement, particularly) spirit.” The violinist now looks forward to two performances of Hartmann’s concerto with Munich’s Bavarian State Orchestra and its music director, Kent Nagano (June 11 & 12).
For appearances with Zurich’s Tonhalle-Orchester under guest conductor Jonathan Nott, Shaham turns to Stravinsky’s Violin Concerto of 1931, a prime example of the legendary Russian’s neoclassical writing, which Balanchine would later use as the score for two ballets. Shaham’s rendition of the work reveals him to be “a consummate technician with an intense emotional side” (Cleveland Plain-Dealer), and in Zurich – with characteristic willingness to work – he juxtaposes it with Bach’s uplifting Violin Concerto in E, BWV1042 (May 5 & 6).
Bach is also in the mix when the violinist embarks on a European recital tour with Japanese pianist Akira Eguchi, his collaborator on the Canary Classics release The Fauré Album, “a very special disc, and one to return to often” (MusicWeb International). Launching at London’s Wigmore Hall on May 3 with subsequent appearances in Zurich (May 8), Vienna (May 9), and Milan (May 10), the tour program showcases the world premiere of In the country of lost things…, a new commission from British composer Julian Milone that was inspired by Paul Auster’s dystopian novel In the Country of Last Things. As Shaham explains, “The work is based on one falling semi-tone and captures the novel’s atmosphere masterfully.”
The upcoming tour program also features another recent commission, Niggunim, Sonata No. 3, which was written for Shaham by Israeli composer Avner Dorman. The violinist describes it as “a very powerful work, filled with dance-like violin music… a ‘Jewish-music melting pot.’” The New York Times judged his premiere of the work last season to be “a dynamic performance,” and added: “Mr. Shaham plunged into the virtuosic thickets of the Scherzo with aplomb, revealing its improvisatory melodies with flair. The concluding Presto unfolded in a kaleidoscopic blaze, a frenzy of jazzy rhythms and explosive energy.”
While Shaham has deservedly won renown for creative and original programming, he remains second to none in the masterworks of the violin mainstream, and rounds out his tour program with Schubert’s A-minor Violin Sonata, Bach’s Third Sonata for Unaccompanied Violin, and – having long championed the virtuoso violin music of Pablo de Sarasate – one of the Spanish Romantic’s most exuberant showpieces: the Carmen Fantasy. When the violinist devoted an evening to similar Sarasate works at New York’s Lincoln Center, the New York Times’s Anthony Tommasini pronounced the event an “undeniable success,” citing Shaham’s “awesome technical control” and “infectious feeling for Sarasate’s music.”
Likewise, while Shaham tackles Berg’s Chamber Concerto for violin, piano, and winds for the first of two upcoming concerts with Michael Tilson Thomas and the London Symphony Orchestra (May 31), for the second he turns to Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 5 in A, “Turkish” (June 3). The concerto – the last Mozart would write for the instrument – is an old favorite of Shaham’s, and at New York’s “Mostly Mozart” Festival, the New York Times reported:
“Mr. Shaham’s playing [of the “Turkish”] was both sweet-toned and trim, every phrase crisply articulated and, in the first two movements, thoughtfully shaped. In the finale, which includes the Turkish dance rhythms and modal figures that earned the work its nickname, the demand is for zest rather than thoughtfulness, and Mr. Shaham gave it all the vigor it wants with no sacrifice in clarity or shape. His choice of cadenzas – he played Joseph Joachim’s – suited the subtle virtuosity of his approach to the work as a whole.”
As for the violinist’s association with Tilson Thomas, it is a rich one, spanning more than two decades of collaboration that date back to Shaham’s first big break, when, while still at school, he was invited to replace an ailing Itzhak Perlman as soloist, also with the LSO. Their musical partnership has flourished ever since, as the Daily Californian recently witnessed:
“A truly special performer, Shaham is more compelling than a firework show — if faced with the choice, one would prefer to watch him. …MTT in particular seemed to relish Shaham’s presence, taking pleasure in his feverish enthusiasm. The audience, moreover, was in raptures, and by the time the piece finished, sat mesmerized for several seconds before remembering to give a standing ovation.”
Additional information about Gil Shaham is available at www.canaryclassics.com, and a list of his upcoming engagements follows.
Gil Shaham – upcoming engagements
April 21; Toronto, ON, Canada
Solo Bach
Koerner Hall (Royal Conservatory of Music)
April 27; Newark, NJ
Berg: Violin Concerto (“To the Memory of an Angel”)
Danielpour: Kaddish (world premiere orchestration)
New Jersey Symphony Orchestra / Jacques Lacombe
New Jersey Performing Arts Center
April 28; New Brunswick, NJ
Berg: Violin Concerto (“To the Memory of an Angel”)
Danielpour: Kaddish
New Jersey Symphony Orchestra / Jacques Lacombe
State Theatre
April 29; Morristown, NJ
Berg: Violin Concerto (“To the Memory of an Angel”)
Danielpour: Kaddish
New Jersey Symphony Orchestra / Jacques Lacombe
Community Theatre at Mayo Performing Arts Center
May 3; London, England
Schubert: Violin sonata (Sonatina) in A minor, D385
Bach: Sonata No. 3 for solo violin, BWV 1005
Avner Dorman: Niggunim for violin and piano
Julian Milone: In the country of lost things… (world premiere)
Sarasate: Carmen Fantasy, Op. 25
Akira Eguchi, piano
Wigmore Hall
May 5 & 6; Zurich, Switzerland
Bach: Concerto for violin and orchestra, BWV 1042
Stravinsky: Concerto for violin and orchestra
Tonhalle-Orchester Zurich / Jonathan Nott
May 8; Zurich, Switzerland
Schubert: Violin sonata (Sonatina) in A minor, D385
Bach: Sonata No. 3 for solo violin, BWV 1005
Avner Dorman: Niggunim for violin and piano
Julian Milone: In the country of lost things…
Sarasate: Carmen Fantasy, Op. 25
Akira Eguchi, piano
May 9; Vienna, Austria
Schubert: Violin sonata (Sonatina) in A minor, D385
Bach: Sonata No. 3 for solo violin, BWV 1005
Avner Dorman: Niggunim for violin and piano
Julian Milone: In the country of lost things…
Sarasate: Carmen Fantasy, Op. 25
Akira Eguchi, piano
May 10; Milan, Italy
Schubert: Violin sonata (Sonatina) in A minor, D385
Bach: Sonata No. 3 for solo violin, BWV 1005
Avner Dorman: Niggunim for violin and piano
Julian Milone: In the country of lost things…
Sarasate: Carmen Fantasy Op. 25
Akira Eguchi, piano
May 31; London, England
Berg: Chamber Concerto
London Symphony Orchestra / Michael Tilson Thomas
June 3; London, England
Mozart: Violin Concerto No. 5 (“Turkish”), K 219
London Symphony Orchestra / Michael Tilson Thomas
June 11 & 12; Munich, Germany
Hartmann: Concerto funèbre for solo violin and string orchestra
Bavarian State Orchestra / Kent Nagano
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