ARTEK Recordings
Contents of the CD1 Booklet
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Both the Pizzetti and Respighi Sonatas performed here on the CD are
particularly significant to me. My attachment to the Respighi stems from the
countless number of times I listened to the inimitable recorded
performance of the work by the awe-inspiring Jascha Heifetz in my
childhood years. It is a piece which was and remains to this day
infrequently performed. Why this is so remains a mystery to me since it
displays all the characteristics of a composer with a great craft and vivid
imagination. Furthermore, having seriously studied the violin, Respighi
fully exploits his knowledge of the instrument in the virtuosic flourishes
and tonal magnificence inherent in this work.
Ildebrando Pizzetti¹s Sonata for Violin and Piano, an even more neglected
work, came to my attention through the very poignant performance by Yehudi
and Hephzibah Menuhin recorded in 1938 for HMV records. Upon hearing this
piece for the first time I was immediately moved by the intensely
impassioned drama and sorrowful quality of the work. The fact that this
masterpiece has suffered more than fifty years of neglect remains an
unsolved puzzle. In coupling these works together on this recording I hope
to restore to the serious music listening public an appreciation of two
unduly neglected masterpieces of the sonata literature.
Ottorino Respighi (1879-1936) was born into a very musical family. His
grandfather was a violinist and organist in Bologna and his father taught
piano at the Liceo Musicale in that same city. His father introduced him to
the piano at an early age and by the time he was twelve his unique musical
gifts were evident enough that he was enrolled in the Liceo. While there he
studied the violin with Federico Sarti and composition with Luigi Torchi and
Guiseppe Martucci. After he graduated with a diploma in violin in 1899 he
left Italy to travel and study and broaden his musical horizon. His first
destination was St. Petersburg, Russia where he worked as a violinist in the
orchestra of the St. Petersburg Opera House. At the same time he studied
composition with Rimsky-Korsakov. Two years later Respighi left Russia to go
to Berlin where he completed his study of composition with Max Bruch.
Between 1903 and 1908 Respighi returned to the concert stage performing as a
concert violinist as well as playing viola in the Mugellini Quartet. He was
also ambitiously composing. In this period he wrote his first opera, Re
Enzo, a notturno for orchestra, and several songs for voice.
In 1908 Respighi returned to Berlin to teach piano for one year in a private
school. Upon returning to Italy he became one of the most important and
dramatic figures among Italian musicians. He was appointed professor of
composition at the Santa Cecilia Academy in Rome, toured extensively as a
conductor programming his own pieces and achieved major success with works
such as Fountains of Rome, Pines of Rome, and the opera Belfagor. In 1923 he
was appointed director of the Santa Cecilia Academy. In 1925 he visited the
United States for the first time, performing with the New York Philharmonic
as a pianist in his Concerto in the Mixolydian Mode. He was engaged by many
other American orchestras during that season and returned on several other
occasions thereafter. By this time, Respighi had established himself in all
parts of the musical world as one of the major composers of his time. In
1932 Respighi was nominated to the Royal Academy of Italy.
Respighi¹s compositional style looks both to the past and to the future. He
was primarily a neo-classicist who was partial to old modes, chants and
classical forms. But what he is most known and appreciated for as a
composer is his tremendous ability to utilize to the fullest, vibrant
contemporary harmony and orchestration to create a vivid imagery.
Orchestral texture certainly plays its part in the Sonata for Violin and
Piano. Even though only two instruments are involved, the musical gesture
and sweep of the writing suggests a tonal experience of much larger scope.
Throughout the piece dynamic contrast is used to its extreme limit and the
dramatic elements of the work depend greatly on the development of
both instruments.
Ildebrando Pizzetti (1880-1968) was born to a musical family in Parma,
Italy. His father, Odvardo Pizzetti was a pianist and was his son¹s first
teacher. He received his musical education at the Conservatorium of Parma
where he studied with Giovanni Tebaldini. Pizzetti, like his
contemporary Respighi, was greatly influenced by the music of the past.
As a result of his early association with Tebaldini, he developed a serious
interest in studying Italian music of the 15th and 16th centuries as well as
cultivating his own personal interest in Gregorian chant and music of the
medieval period. These influences are strongly represented in much of
Pizzetti¹s compositions.
Pizzetti taught at the Conservatory of Parma, the Conservatory of Milan, and
the Academy of Santa Cecilia in Rome. He was primarily known for his operas
and choral works. At the height of his career, the most
prominent Italian music critic Guido Gatti proclaimed Pizzetti ³doubtless
the greatest musician in Italy today,² a rather powerful statement
considering that Puccini was still alive.
Pizzetti¹s only sonata for violin and piano is an intensely dramatic work.
Written between 1918 and 1919 the work deals with strong humanistic
concerns. As in his opera Debora e Jaele (composed from 1915 to 1921
and premiered in 1922) Pizzetti is deeply involved with the torments of war.
The strong emotional impact of the first movement is portrayed through an
almost pleading, crying character in the violin while the
independent themes in the piano dwell on more turbulent repetitive motifs.
The second movement, entitled Preghiera per gl¹innocenti (prayer for the
innocents) is a passionate expression of grief. The character of the opening
themes suggests an almost pleading quality for God to grant pity on those
who have suffered. In this movement one is also distinctly aware of
Pizzetti¹s closeness to early religious music. The opening theme¹s strong
resemblance to early religious chant is most evident. Only in the last
movement does the veil of sadness and tragedy lift to give way to a rebirth
of optimism; a possible light at the end of a dark tunnel. Composed in a
rondo-like structure, Pizzetti introduces a variety of interesting new
material, themes light and airy, some rustic in character and yet others
possessing an almost impressionistic flavor. The movement closes in an
exciting burst of musical energy, as if almost to suggest that time
eventually heals all pain and suffering.
- Elmar Oliveira
Elmar Oliveira, violin
Elmar Oliveira has taken his place as one of the most
commanding violinists of our time, with his unsurpassed
combination of impeccable artistry and old-world elegance. Mr. Oliveira is
one of a few major artists committed to the entire spectrum of the violin
world constantly expanding the
traditional repertoire boundaries as a champion of
contemporary music and rarely heard works of the past,
devoting energy to the development of the young artists of tomorrow, and
enthusiastically supporting the art of modern violin and bow makers.
Among his generation¹s most honored artists, Elmar Oliveira remains the
first and only American violinist to
win the Gold Medal at Moscow¹s Tchaikovsky International Competition. He is
also the only violinist to receive the
coveted Avery Fisher Prize, in addition to capturing First
Prizes at the Naumberg International Competition and the G.B. Dealey
Competition.
Mr. Oliveira¹s rigorous itinerary includes the Chicago, Boston, San
Francisco, National, Seattle, Dallas, Baltimore, New Zealand, St. Louis,
Pittsburgh and London Symphonies; the Cleveland, Leipzig Gewandhaus,
Minnesota, Zurich Tonhalle, and Philadelphia Orchestras; and the New York,
Los Angeles, and London Philharmonics. He has toured the Far East, South
America, and Australia.
Mr. Oliveira¹s repertoire is among the most diverse of any of today¹s
pre-eminent artists. He has
premiered works by such distinguished composers as Morton Gould, Ezra
Laderman, Charles Wuorinen, Joan Tower, Andrzej Panufnik, Benjamin Lees,
Nicholas Flagello, Leonard Rosenman, Hugh Aitken, Richard Yardumian, and
Krzysztof Penderecki. He has also performed seldom heard concerti by Alberto
Ginastera, Einojuhani Rautavaara, Joseph Joachim, and many others.
A prodigious recording artist, Elmar Oliveira is a two time Grammy
nominee for his CD of the Barber Concerto with Leonard Slatkin and the Saint
Louis Symphony. His best selling new recording of the Rautavaara Violin
Concerto with the Helsinki Philharmonic has won him tremendous acclaim,
including the 1998 Cannes Classical Award and Gramophone¹s ³Editor¹s
Choice². Two current,
historically significant recordings feature Mr. Oliveira: The Miracle
Makers, for which he performs on thirty great Stradivari and Guarneri del
Gesu violins, and a compact disc highlighting the Library of Congress¹ rare
violin collection.
Elmar Oliveira performs on an instrument known as the ³Lady Stretton,²
made by Giuseppe Guarneri del Gesu in 1726.
Robert Koenig, Piano
Born in Canada, pianist Robert Koenig began his formal training at the
Vancouver Academy of Music and later studied at the Banff Centre for the
Arts and the Academie Musicale di Chigiana in Italy. He received both his
bachelor¹s and master¹s degrees in
accompanying from the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where he
studied privately with Dr. Vladimir Sokoloff and
chamber music with Felix Galimir and Karen Tuttle. He has appeared at many
festivals, including Aspen, Ravinia, Banff, the Campos do Jordao Festival in
Brazil and the Mostly Mozart Festival in New York. European engagements have
included performances in London, Paris, Milan, Frankfurt, Munich and Moscow,
while in Asia he has appeared at Suntory Hall in Tokyo and the National
Theater of Taipei. Recent performances in the U.S. have won him applause in
Lincoln Center¹s Alice Tully Hall in New York, the Kennedy Center in
Washington, D.C., and the Academy of Music in Philadelphia. He is also
frequently heard on radio and television including the CBC Network in
Canada, WQXR Radio in New York, the BBC in London, and ABC¹s Good Morning
America. Past summers have seen him in residence at the Aspen Music
Festival, where he served as staff accompanist for Dorothy DeLay and her
associates. During the year, he continues his position with DeLay at The
Juilliard School.
Ottorino Respighi
Sonata for violin and piano in b minor
1. Moderato 8:47
2. Andante espressivo 8:34
3. Passacaglia Allegro moderato 6:52
ma energico
Ildebrando Pizzetti
Sonata for violin and piano in A major
4. Tempestoso 12:36
5. Preghiera per gl¹innocenti 8:46
molto largo
6. Vivo e Fresco 9:01
Recorded on April 10, 1998
Producer: Laura Harth Rodriguez
Engineer: Francisco Rodriguez
Graphic Design: Jim Manly
Cover Painting: Piero Sadun - ³Profonditi di Spazi²
Painting Photo: Berit Schumann
Special Thanks: Regis Iandiorio, Jill Jaffe