Violin Concerto

Violin Concerto

If you know the songs Taking a Chance on Love , I Can't Get Started , April in Paris , What Is There To Say , or Autumn in New York , then you are already familiar with the music of legendary American songwriter Vernon Duke. He collaborated with Johnny Mercer, Ira Gershwin, Ogden Nash, Sammy Cahn, John Latouche, and Yip Harburg, and wrote celebrated scores for Broadway and Hollywood. What you may not know is that he was born Vladimir Dukelsky, admitted to the Kiev Conservatory at age 11, where he studied composition with Reinhold GliÃ¨re and met his older colleague and lifelong friend Sergei Prokofiev. His family escaped Russia during the revolution and arrived in America in 1921, and within a year had befriended a musician named Jacob Gershowitz (you know him as George Gershwin), who persuaded him to Americanize his name and write for musical theater.

Duke gained fame and fortune as a songwriter, but continued to compose concert works and Russian poetry under his original name. His serious music, stylistically similar to that of his friend Prokofiev as well as Shostakovich, also contains flashes of the American style of Roy Harris, Peter Mennin, and their mid-twentieth century contemporaries, balanced with elements of the late Russian romantic style. And it is of such fine quality and compelling listenability that the neglect of these works is scandalous.

Urlicht AudioVisual is pleased to announce the world premiere recording of Duke s Violin Concerto, along with Capriccio MÃ©xicano and Hommage to Offenbach. Also featured are Duke s Violin Sonata (commissioned by Roman Totenberg) and the Etude for Violin and Bassoon.

Diana Burgin, the daughter of Ruth Posselt (1911-2007), the distinguished violinist who performed the premier of Duke s Violin Concerto, shared the following of her mother s recollections about the work and its premiere:

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Duke wrote [it] at the suggestion of Jascha Heifetz and completed the piano score in 1941. The full score was not finished until shortly before the premier performances, given in March 1943 at Symphony Hall in Boston by my mother, violinist Ruth Posselt with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and my father Richard Burgin at the podium. ... [In a rather bitter prior episode for Duke, Heifetz had declined to premiere the work as it wasn t completely to (his) liking ; more to the point, Heifetz probably just didn t want to pay the commission.] My mother received the manuscript of Duke s concerto in early 1942, and that summer, played it (with piano) two times through for Koussevitzky, Duke and others at the conductor s home in Tanglewood. The concerto aroused great enthusiasm, and Koussevitzky programmed the work for the BSO for the spring of the 1942-43 season.
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Duke s four other works for violin are equally appealing and listenable, including the late Hommage to Offenbach, a humorous suite for violin and piano that was discovered in the Library of Congress by violinist Elmira Darvarova while researching other works for this CD. Ms. Darvarova, a student of Yfrah Neaman, Henryk Szeryng and Josef Gingold, created a sensation as James Levine s hand-picked concertmaster for the MET Orchestra the only woman to have ever held that seat and founded the New York Chamber Music Festival, now the kick-off of the city's music season, in 2010.
She is accompanied at the piano and on the podium by dynamic American maestro Scott Dunn, arguably the foremost authority on Duke s music for the concert hall, and a specialist in music by composers whose music straddles traditional concert works and music for film, television, and popular musicians; New York Philharmonic Associate Principal Bassoonist Kim Laskowski, whose playing ranges from Bach to 10,000 Maniacs; and the acclaimed ORF Radio-Symphonieorchester Wien.
Country USA
Brand URLICHT
Manufacturer Urlicht Audiovisual
Binding Audio CD
ItemPartNumber 43171-552854
Model 43171-552854
ReleaseDate 2014-12-02
UnitCount 1
Format Import
UPCs 783583260404
EANs 0783583260404

Country	USA
Brand	URLICHT
Manufacturer	Urlicht Audiovisual
Binding	Audio CD
ItemPartNumber	43171-552854
Model	43171-552854
ReleaseDate	2014-12-02
UnitCount	1
Format	Import
UPCs	783583260404
EANs	0783583260404

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