Beethoven - Violin Concerto [Zukerman/ Barenboim-Chicago Symphony Orchestra] I played the Sibelius Concerto on this disc last month [10th April 2011], and that was such a wonderful experience, for me the Beethoven Concerto isn't a work which i would place on the same level, many people feel that Beethoven's Concerto is the greatest, i've never felt that way about it, i really do like it a lot, but i'm not sure it would even get into my top ten of Violin Concertos, today it was good to listen to this again, and maybe try and see what others see, and i don't.
Pinchas Zukerman is now 62, born in Israel, he emigrated to America, then Canada, this recording was made in 1977, the booklet photo [by Gerd Weissing] is just absolutely fantastic, the sun peeping out behind the clouds, over a lake, loads of real interest here, and the lettering box and logo are nice too, with a dash of orange.
The Beethoven Concerto is vast, over 45 minutes long, with a first movement of 25 minutes, longer than the other two put together, watching some of the video of Zukerman below, these Violinists play without any score in front of them, how do they find their way around?, with so many similar phrases in this Concerto, surely it's so easy to get lost somewhere, and go round in circles, testament to the genius of Zukerman, it takes a hefty 3 minutes plus before the soloist comes in [3:21], initial listeners must have wondered if they were not listening to a Symphony by mistake, i feel that the first movement needs to be taken as a whole, and like a forest of trees, the grandeur isn't in a single tree, it's the sweep of the whole forest, however here are a few little highlight points, [6:17-6:26], a nice little surge, and the violin gets high in the treble, a nice little climax, and a nice thunderous forte by the orchestra, playing the main tune with real power [9:37-10:30], and a nice transition from quiet soloist to noisy orchestra [14:40+], and another very high treble violin climax [17:29-7:35], right at the end there's a very long 3 minute solo cadenza [20:37-23:42], i enjoyed this today.
Here's Pinchas Zukerman playing the first movement on YouTube.
