Alberto Ginastera; L. Bernstein; S. Moussa - Works for Violin and Orchestra (Andrew Wan)

Information

Composer: Alberto Ginastera; Leonard Bernstein; Samy Moussa

• (01) Ginastera - Violin Concerto, Op. 30
• (12) Bernstein - Serenade for Solo Violin, Strings, Harp and Percussion
• (17) Moussa - Violin Concerto 'Adrano'

Andrew Wan, violin

Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal

Kent Nagano, conductor

Date: 2020

Label: Analekta

https://www.analekta.com/albums/ginastera-bernstein-moussa-oeuvres-violon-orchestre-andrew-wan-osm/

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Review

Alberto Ginastera, previously known for colourfully scored evocations of Argentinian folk music, embraced serialism, microtones and aleatorism in his 1963 Violin Concerto. It’s a dark half-hour. The lengthy, brooding, opening Cadenza for solo violin “serves,” wrote Ginastera, “to introduce the basic materials of the entire concerto.” Seven percussionists play dozens of instruments in eerily quiet “night music” and angry fortissimi. The Adagio for 22 Soloists exudes struggle and anguish. The finale, Ginastera wrote, begins “at a flying pace, in a mysterious, scarcely audible whisper.” It ends in a violent Perpetuum mobile.

Plato’s Symposium, in which banquet guests philosophize about love, inspired Leonard Bernstein’s Serenade for Solo Violin, Strings, Harp and Percussion (1954), five movements each titled for one or two of the participants. It’s pure Bernstein – sentimental, playful, jaunty, 

helter-skelter and joyous, peaking emotionally in the bittersweet fourth movement adagio, Agathon. The final, longest movement, Socrates; Alcibiades, finds Bernstein striving for profundity before resorting to Broadway song-and-dance to reach the finish line. 

The four-movement Violin Concerto by Montreal native Samy Moussa (b.1989) was premiered by concertmaster Andrew Wan, music director Kent Nagano and the MSO on Nov. 28, 2019. Subtitled Adrano (the fire-god beneath Mount Etna) – Moussa’s visit to the volcano inspired him – it begins with slow, ascending chords, the violin in its upper register. Pizzicati strings pluck us higher, there’s an eruption of immense energy, then gentle subsidence, echoing the initial chords. The music recalls Strauss’s Alpine Symphony and the opening of his Also Sprach Zarathustra, but without their triumphant climaxes. Lasting only 15 minutes, half the length of Ginastera’s and Bernstein’s compositions, it needs fleshing out to achieve its considerable potential. The booklet says these works were recorded in concert, yet no applause is heard. These high-voltage performances surely deserve the sounds of many more than one hand clapping.

-- Michael Schulman, mySCENA

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Alberto Ginastera (April 11, 1916 – June 25, 1983) was an Argentine composer of classical music. He is considered one of the most important 20th-century classical composers of the Americas. Many of Ginastera's works were inspired by the Gauchesco tradition. His early nationalistic works often integrate Argentine folk themes, while works in the later periods incorporate traditional elements in increasingly abstracted forms. Ginastera held a number of teaching posts. Among his notable students were Ástor Piazzolla (who studied with him in 1941), Alcides Lanza, Waldo de los Ríos, Jacqueline Nova and Rafael Aponte-Ledée.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alberto_Ginastera

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Leonard Bernstein (August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American composer, conductor, author, music lecturer, and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the US to receive worldwide acclaim. His fame derived from his tenure as the music director of the New York Philharmonic, his concerts with most of the world's leading orchestras, and his composition. As a composer he wrote in many styles encompassing symphonic and orchestral music, ballet, film and theatre music, choral works, opera, chamber music and piano. He also gave numerous television lectures on classical music.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Bernstein

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Samy Moussa (born June 1, 1984 in Montreal, Québec) is a Canadian conductor and composer of classical music whose works have been performed internationally.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samy_Moussa

http://www.samymoussa.com/

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Andrew Wan (born 1983 in Edmonton, Alberta) is a Canadian violinist who has been Concertmaster of the Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal since 2008.

https://www.allmusic.com/artist/andrew-wan-mn0002629488/biography

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