Tchaikovsky - Violin Concerto [Josefowicz/ Marriner-Academy Of Saint Martin In The Fields]Born in Canada, but has lived virtually all her life in America, a child prodigy, even a Catwalk Queen, she was only 17 when she recorded this Concerto, she's now almost twice that age.
Don't get the idea that this is some whizz kid let loose with an ancient Strad, she really creates a mature performance, but one that's also red hot with passion too, this is a technically difficult Concerto, but she really pulls it off.
I so much enjoyed the fire of the first movement, it's full of Slavic wit and bravura, it's hard to pinpoint some truly inspired passage over other passages, and memorable bits fly at you thick and fast, in trying to write how i feel, it makes me realize what a feast this movement truly is, i find it so hard to just single out one passage, in the slow passages Josefowicz has playing of supreme pathos [3:02 to roughly 4 minutes], and tremendous virtuoso fast bowing [5:06-6:11], i like the way Tchaikovsky has some nice nationalistic almost Marche Slave forte moments [6:11-6:44 & 8:40-8:56], Josefowicz traverses the difficulties of playing almost two ideas simultaneously with ease [7:30-8:39], on a piano you've got two hands to play bass and treble at the same time, the same must be so hard for a Violinist, for me this is probably the highlight of this listening, towards the end of the movement, there's some exciting high tessitura playing [14:09-15:22], and added on the end of that, tremendously fast bowing too [15:22-15:38], it's hard to explain the last couple of minutes of this movement, except that Tchaikovsky pulls out all the stops in one last exultant showpiece, fragments [sparks?] fly left and right, it's a real showstopper Sarasate and Paganini would have been proud of, what a piece of music!.
Here's Leila Josefowicz playing the First movement on YouTube.
No comments:
Post a Comment