The Violin Concerto No. 2 in C-sharp minor, Op. 129, was Dmitri Shostakovich's last concerto. He wrote it in the spring of 1967 and intended it to serve as a 60th birthday present for its dedicatee, David Oistrakh, in September. However, Shostakovich had mistaken Oistrakh's age; he actually turned 59 that year. [a] It was premiered unofficially in Bolshevo, near Moscow, on 13 September 1967, and officially on 26 September by Oistrakh and the Moscow Philharmonic under Kirill Kondrashin in Moscow. [1]
Scoring and structure
The concerto is scored for solo violin, piccolo, flute, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, contrabassoon, four horns, timpani, tom-tom drum and strings. [1]
A performance of the piece lasts approximately 33 minutes. [1] It has three movements:
Analysis
The key of C-sharp minor is a difficult one for the violin. [1]
The first movement is in sonata form [1] and concludes with a contrapuntal cadenza. The Adagio is in three parts, with a central accompanied cadenza. The final movement is a complex rondo. It has a slow introduction, three episodes between the refrains, and a further long cadenza before the third episode reprising material from earlier in the work. [2]
Notes
- ^ Shostakovich wrote his only Violin Sonata for Oistrakh the following year to make up for this error.
References
- ^ a b c d e Robinson, Harlow. "Violin Concerto No. 2". Boston Symphony Orchestra. Retrieved 5 February 2024.
-
^
MacDonald, Malcolm (2008). "Shostakovich's string concertos and sonatas". In Fairclough, Pauline;
Fanning, David (eds.). The Cambridge Companion to Shostakovich.
Cambridge University Press. pp. 134–135.
ISBN
978-0-521-84220-4.
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