{ Program Notes
fairer judgment of the concerto’s worth
came from an anonymous critic for the
Wiener Abendpost: “The first movement
with its splendid, healthy themes, the
mysterious, quiet middle movement (who
could fail to be reminded by this of Turgenev’s female characters!) and the wild
peasant dance make up a whole for which
we would claim an outstanding place
among contemporary compositions.”
Today, this work holds an outstanding
place among all violin concertos. One of
the more demanding works for the violin
virtuoso, it is more remarkable still for its
unwavering melodic inspiration and passionate expression of human feeling. Here
Tchaikovsky speaks to us from the heart,
using the communicative voice of the solo
violin as his medium.
The concerto came in the aftermath
of the composer’s ill-conceived marriage
to Antonina Milyukova in 1877. Eight
months later in March 1878, his wanderings to escape his wife brought him to
Clarens, Switzerland on the shores of Lake
Geneva. Here he and his brother Modest were visited by the gifted 22-year-old
violinist Yosif Kotek, a composition pupil
of Tchaikovsky’s in Moscow. Kotek had
been a witness at the composer’s wedding and a confidante of his post-nuptial
anguish; now he provided both artistic
inspiration and practical technical advice
for Tchaikovsky’s recently begun Violin
Concerto. In less than a month, the work
was nearly finished, and on April 3, Kotek
and Tchaikovsky gave it a full reading at
the piano. After the run-through, both
agreed the slow movement was too slight
for such a large work, and in one day flat,
the composer replaced it with the tenderly
melancholic Andante second movement it
bears today.
So prodigal is Tchaikovsky’s melodic
inspiration that he can afford to begin the
sonata-form opening movement with a
lovely little theme for orchestral violins
and then — just as he did at the beginning of his First Piano Concerto — never
play it again. The orchestra next hints at
the big theme to come and provides anticipatory excitement for the soloist. After
a brief warm-up stretch, he launches one
of Tchaikovsky’s most inspired themes,
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and one with multiple personalities. At
first, it is gentle, even wistful, but when
the orchestra takes it up a few minutes
later, it becomes very grand: music for an
Imperial Russian ball. Later still in the
development section, the soloist transforms it again with an intricately ornamented, double-stopped variation. The
violin’s second theme, begun in its warm
lower register, retains its wistful nature.
Much later