Although he has been acclaimed as a “mature mas-
ter of his instrument,” Pinchas Zukerman is, at this
writing, only 23 years of age. This young violinist,
who has been compared to the great virtuoso Jascha
Heifetz, has received phenomenal acceptance from
audiences and critics around the world. A Munich
reviewer wrote that “for years, there has not been
anything like an equivalent violinistic discovery.”
And when Zukerman’s first recording was released
in the United States, a critic in Stereo Review asked,
“Whatever happened to the violin virtuosos? The
giants of yesterday have faded away [but] I would
still like to cast a “yea’ vote for Pinchas Zukerman.”
Zukerman is a citizen of Israel, where he was
born in 1948. He began his career in 1961, when
Isaac Stern and Pablo Casals heard him perform and
recommended that he pursue the violin as a pro-
fession. (Prior to this, he had studied at the Israel
Conservatory and the Academy of Music in Tel-
Aviv and had won a scholarship from the America-
Israel Cultural Foundation.) After studies with Ivan
Galamian at the Juilliard School in New York, in
1967 he won the Leventritt International Award
competition held in Carnegie Hall. A series of or-
chestral appearances followed in North and South
America and at the Spoleto Festival in Italy and the
Casals Festival in Puerto Rico.
Then, in the 1968-69 season, he won great ac-
claim by substituting for Isaac Stern in a series of
concerts and by making his New York debut with
Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic.
In the same season, he made his first album with
Columbia Records, performing the Mendelssohn
and Tchaikovsky Violin Concertos—an album that
was called by High Fidelity magazine “the most im-
portant debut recording of the season.”
In this new album, Pinchas Zukerman again dem-
onstrates his unusual affinity for the great Romantic
violin repertory as he performs a program that
amply displays what a High Fidelity critic described
as the essence of Zukerman’s art: “joyousness, a
romantic sympathy, a kind of big-boned yet never
indelicate strength.”
The Violin Concerto No. 2 by Henryk Wieniawski (1835-
1880) has always held an especially strong appeal for
both performers and audiences. The reasons are imimedi-
ately apparent: It is a rich, poetic work of intense Roman-
tic expression that demands from its soloist not only the
utmost in brilliant virtuoso technique but also warmth of
expression and elegance of style. The Concerto, one of
two such works by Wieniawski, was published in 1870
and earned the praise of fellow-composer Peter Ilyitch
Tchaikovsky. When Wieniawski lay dying in Moscow, in
March 1880, the great Russian wrote to his patroness,
Madame von Meck: “Your benevolence to poor dying
Wieniawski touches me deeply. . . . I pity him greatly. In
him, we shall lose an incomparable violinist and gifted
composer. I think Wieniawski very talented . . . parts of
the D Minor Concerto show a true creative gift.”
The work opens (Allegro moderato) with an orchestral
introduction. Soon, the soloist enters with the same
theme, developing it with glistening passage-work. Then,
the second theme is presented, a beautiful, heartfelt mel-
ody, after which there is a generous display of virtuoso
writing. Without pause, the second part begins with a
twelve-measure clarinet solo. This Romance is one of par-
ticular beauty—Wieniawski at the height of his composi-
tional powers—and is often played in concert as a sepa-
rate piece. The exciting and ebullient finale, with its
unmistakable Hungarian gypsy flavor and dazzling ca-
denza, has never failed to win admirers for the colorful
musical style of the super-Romantic Pole, Henryk
Wieniawski.
Dimitri Kabalevsky’s Violin Concerto haa its premiere
performance at the Great Hall of Moscow Conservatory
on October 29, 1948. Igor Bezrodny was the soloist. The
work enjoyed an immediate success and has since been
received into the repertory of many leading violinists. It
is written in the strongest Russian Romantic tradition
and has rightfully taken its place beside the violin con-
certos of such masters as Prokofiev, Glazunov and Tchai-
kovsky—which is to say that it holds fast to warm and
simple cantabile melodies while, at the same time, utiliz-
ing 20th-century techniques, especially in orchestration.
The Concerto opens with a fresh, quickly moving
Allegro, which immediately brings to mind the good-
humored central figure of this composer’s first opera,
“Colas Breugnon.” The Andante presents the violin with
a particularly beautiful and sustained melody, which, for
simplicity and calm, is as beautiful as anything written
for the violin in the 20th century. After a development
with a lighter character, the Concerto returns to the main
theme, which, this time, is taken by the orchestra. To-
ward the end, the violin regains the melody and closes
the movement in an intimate mood. In the third move-
ment, Kabalevsky again demonstrates his infectious élan.
The cadenza contains a humorous nod in the direction of
Mendelssohn, after which the work moves on to a quick
close with a short and victorious coda.
Ernest Bloch (1880-1959) originally composed his “Baal
Shem” Suite for violin and piano. When he orchestrated
it, he fused the dominating solo voice most impressively
with full symphony orchestra.
Baal Shem was the founder of the sect of Hassidism
that flourished in Poland beginning in the mid-18th cen-
tury. Hassidism is built around joy, pleasure and love, the
belief that no one is beyond redemption and that an ele-
ment of the divine exists in everything that lives. Baal
Shem’s followers celebrated their holidays with elaborate
feasts, dancing and music that often approached ecstasy
in celebration of the glory of God.
Presented musically in this suite are three different pic-
tures of Hassidic life: Vidui (Contrition); Nigun (Im-
provisation); Simchas Torah (Rejoicing). “Nigun” is a
reflection of the religious chanting of the true Hassid, in
which Bloch emphasized the dark side of the violin—its
melodic flexibility and its uniquely dramatic expressive
lower.
# —Joseph Scuro
Engineering: Robert Gooch, Roy Emerson, Bernard O’Gorman
Library of Congress catalog card numbers 73-752144, 77-752145 and 70-752146
apply to M 30644.
Other albums by Pinchas Zukerman:
Mozart: Violin Concerto No. 5 in A Major (“Turkish”); Violin
Concerto No. 4 in D Major (English Chamber Orchestra; Daniel
Barenboim, Conductor) ...........6+ee+esseeeeses eM 30055
Saint-Saéns: Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso; Chausson:
Poéme; Wieniawski: Concert Polonaise in D Major; Vieuxtemps:
Violin Concerto No. 5 in A Minor (London Symphony Orches-
tra; Charles Mackerras, Conductor) .................MS 7422
Mendelssohn: Violin Concerto in E Minor (New York Philhar-
monic; Leonard Bernstein, Conductor); Tchaikovsky: Violin
Concerto in D Major (London Symphony Orchestra; Antal
Dorati, Conductor) ..5 0.0 ccnccccccedocvevcsvsvessssMoOTSIS
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