Lydia Mordkovitchplays Bacewicz Enescu with Ian Fountain CHAN 10476 piano CHAN 10476 Booklet Cover.indd 1 21/4/08 22:50:32 Works for Violin and Piano Peter Joslin Collection George Enescu (1881–1955) Violin Sonata No. 2, Op. 6 25:10 in F minor . in f-Moll . en fa mineur 1 I Assez mouvementé – Très vite – Ier mouvement 9:02 2 II Tranquillement – 7:56 3 III Vif 8:06 Graz˙yna Bacewicz (1909 –1969) Sonata da camera 13:41 4 I Largo (–) :16 5 II Allegro 2:0 6 III Tempo di minuetto :08 7 IV Andante sostenuto :17 8 V Gigue. Molto allegro 1:46 George Enescu Bacewicz/Enescu: Works for Violin and Piano Graz˙yna Bacewicz George Enescu (1881–1955) and Graz˙yna when he completed the Second Violin Sonata. Violin Sonata No. 3 18:35 Bacewicz (1909 –1969) were part of a long His world here is not Romanian, but rather 9 I Allegro moderato – Allegro appassionato 4:44 tradition of composer-performers from German (Brahms) filtered through a French 10 II Adagio 4:25 Eastern Europe. Both studied in Paris (Enescu prism (Franck and Fauré). The opening of the in the 1890s, Bacewicz in the 190s); both Assez mouvementé combines a tonally and 11 III Scherzo. Vivo :40 were professional violinists and pianists metrically mobile theme in crotchets with a 12 IV Finale. Andante – Moderato 5:2 who imbued their music with a profound lilting motif that permeates the movement’s knowledge of their instruments. They each 9/4 metre. There is even a string of melodic showed a healthy respect for the traditions whole tones in the descending scale which Graz˙yna Bacewicz which they inherited and an individual take occurs as part of the first subject group and Partita 16:56 on their reinterpretation. again at the main climax. In contrast, the Whereas Bacewicz only occasionally main melody of the central movement has a 13 I Prelude. Grave – Grandioso 6:25 incorporated folk styles into her music, simple, folk-like charm, although it develops 14 II Toccata. Vivace :5 Enescu is still best known for those works into an impassioned arioso. Like the first 15 III Intermezzo. Andantino melancolico :16 where folk traditions from his native Romania movement, the second ends introspectively, are in the foreground. These include his ever- this time with a passing reference to the 16 IV Rondo. Presto :1 popular First Romanian Rhapsody (1901) and triadic motifs from the opening of the sonata. TT 74:50 the Third Violin Sonata ‘dans le caractère Alongside metrical ambiguity, these triadic populaire roumain’ (1926). His Violin Sonata elements also return in witty guise in the No. 2 (1899) predates these pieces and was opening theme of the finale (très léger et Lydia Mordkovitch violin premiered by the violinist Jacques Thibaud, rythmé). The invigorating interplay of the with Enescu at the piano, at the Concerts- two instruments leads to a striking second Ian Fountain piano Colonne in Paris on 22 February 1900 subject with pounding chords on the piano Lydia Mordkovitch and Ian Fountain would like to express their gratitude (Enescu had played the violin at the premiere (très sec) and long notes on the violin’s for the generous support of the Royal Academy of Music in this recording. of his First Violin Sonata, with Alfred Cortot lowest string (très vibrant et à plein son). as the pianist). This theme turns out to be nothing less than Enescu was a prodigy as both performer the full opening theme of the sonata, though and composer and was not yet eighteen it is cut in half by brief tremolando quavers. 4 5 Enescu continues to have fun with this twists. Even though the composer was Six years were to pass before the Partita climax in double-stops. The thirty-eight bars familiar material until the climax where the renowned for the verve of her fast music (the (1955). In that time, Bacewicz had won an of the Intermezzo (Andantino melancolico) piano reintroduces the theme of the second concluding Gigue in 6/8 is characteristically international prize for her Fourth Quartet, are the most haunting of the whole work, movement (avec une sonorité de carillon) and tongue-in-cheek), the heart of her music lies composed the imposing Third Symphony the violin’s soliloquising put into relief by it becomes transparent how interlocked the in its passionate lyricism, as in the fourth (1952) and premiered her Second Piano aperiodic chiming dissonances on the piano. sonata’s main themes are. The recapitulation movement. Sonata (195). They were tough years for all Bacewicz was evidently possessed by the and coda toy again with these cyclic ideas, Bacewicz’s Violin Sonata No. 3 (1948) is Polish composers, yet Bacewicz managed to opening melodic idea because she returned before giving way to the finalpppp flourishes. one of her lesser-known pieces. She premiered maintain her creative integrity as well as almost to it time and again in the works of her last Bacewicz was born in Łódz, in central it in her home town on 15 February 1948, single-handedly saving Polish chamber music decade. Poland, at a time when her country was still with her other brother, the pianist Kiejstut from extinction (socialist realism preferred © 2008 Adrian Thomas partitioned between Austria, Prussia and Bacewicz (they had also performed the Sonata monumental symphonies, simple mass songs Russia. She came from a Polish-Lithuanian da camera in Paris’s Salle Gaveau on 2 May and panegyric cantatas). Even before the so- family, and while one her siblings – the 1946 and were to premiere the later Partita called ‘thaw’ set in (marked by the first ‘Warsaw Lydia Mordkovitch was born in Russia composer Vytautas Bacevicˆius – chose his in Warsaw in 1955). Bacewicz is frequently Autumn’ festival in 1956), she pursued an and studied at the Odessa Conservatory, Lithuanian roots, Bacewicz was educated labelled a neoclassicist, but her approach is uncompromisingly gritty idiom in her Fifth then at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory and lived in Poland apart from her studies in much more robust and muscular than that of String Quartet and the Partita (which also exists in Moscow where she was master pupil Paris. After the war she performed as a solo many of her contemporaries. The Third Violin in a version for violin and orchestra). and assistant to David Oistrakh. She violinist as well as composing some of the Sonata is no exception. The opening movement The Partita alternates fast and slow emigrated to Israel in 1974 and since 1980 works for which she is best known: the String begins rhapsodically, quixotically introducing movements, whose titles recall eighteenth- has lived in Britain, appearing regularly Quartets Nos -5 (1947, 1951, 1955) and the the vigorous main theme. This is eventually century models. The second and fourth with the London Symphony Orchestra, Concerto for String Orchestra (1948). followed by skittish sul ponticello tremoli movements – Toccata and Rondo – are the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the The Sonata da camera (1945), introducing the second theme, whose lyricism virtuosic displays technically propelled by a Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, The Hallé sometimes referred to as Violin Sonata is reminiscent of Szymanowski. For the period nervous energy which rarely acknowledges a Orchestra, the BBC Philharmonic and No.1, is something of a curiosity in its close (the late 1940s, when socialist-realist dogma constant audible metre for long. The Rondo the English Chamber Orchestra. She has adherence to eighteenth-century stylisations. from the Soviet Union began to dominate also suggests origins in the mazurka’s worked with such distinguished conductors While initially it seems to be pastiche, it Polish cultural life), the Adagio is intensely faster cousin, the oberek, recalling clear-cut as Sir Georg Solti, Riccardo Muti, Vassily surprises with unexpected twists. These lyrical and non-diatonic. Metrical teasing and references to this dance in the finales of her Sinaisky, Neeme Järvi, Richard Hickox, Hugo quirky moments may be harmonic (partway evident virtuosity mark the Scherzo, while Piano Concerto (1949) and Second Piano Wolff, Ian Leighton-Konig, Vernon Handley, through the opening Largo) or metrical (the the Finale prefers more moderate tempi than Sonata. Once again, however, the heart of Gennady Rozhdestvensky and Stanislav initial idea of the ensuing Allegro is a five-bar usual, in part linking back to the start of the the music lies in the slow movements. The Skrowaczewski. An impressive discography phrase); the Trio of the central Tempo di sonata with an exploration of a descending Preludium’s trudging piano part is almost of well over fifty recordings reflects Lydia minuetto has particularly teasing metrical chromatic scale. funereal, the violin rising to an impassioned Mordkovitch’s very wide repertoire, and 6 7 encompasses music from the complete works with Robert Bottone and Sulamita Aronovsky. for solo violin by Bach to the concertos of Since 2001 Ian Fountain has been a piano Bacewicz/Enescu: Werke für Violine und Klavier Shostakovich, her recording of which for professor at the Royal Academy of Music Chandos won a Gramophone Award and a in London. He has performed extensively Diapason d’Or. Her work has twice been throughout Europe, the USA, the Middle George Enescu (1881–1955) und Graz˙yna Violinsonate hatte Enescu den Geigenpart nominated for a Gramophone Award and East and the UK, with orchestras such as the Bacewicz (1909 –1969) gehörten zu einer gespielt, mit Alfred Cortot als Pianist). has received seven Critics’ Choices; recent London Symphony Orchestra, Philharmonia, lange währenden Tradition osteuropäischer Enescu war sowohl als Interpret wie recordings have won major nominations or City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Komponisten/Interpreten. Beide studierten auch als Komponist ein frühreifes Talent prizes across Europe.