Born on December 8, 1865, in Hämeenlinna, Finland; died on September 20, 1957, in Järvenpää, Finland
Concerto in D minor for Violin and Orchestra
Allegro moderato
Adagio di molto
Allegro, ma non tanto
Composed: 1904; revised in 1905
Estimated length: 38 minutes
First performance: February 8, 1904, in Helsinki, with Victor Nováček as the soloist and the composer conducting; revised/standard version on October 19, 1905, in Berlin, with Karel Halíř as the soloist and Richard Strauss conducting the Berlin Court Orchestra.
First Nashville Symphony performance: February 17, 1953, with Guy Taylor conducting at War Memorial Auditorium.
Jean Sibelius wrote his sole Violin Concerto during a period that was particularly difficult in his personal life, when he was struggling with a drinking problem and financial insecurity. He had burst on the scene around the turn of the century with a programmatically oriented, late-Romantic style that gave voice to the unique aura of Finnish folklore and the natural beauty of his homeland. Sibelius had even become identified with the patriotic call for national liberation during a period when Finland was still under the yoke of czarist Russian rule.
The Violin Concerto steps away from easily identifiable references to Finnish culture and mythology—although commentators have never ceased to detect evocations of the northern landscape or local color in this music (from the Aurora Borealis to polar bears).
Instead, there is an autobiographical layer in the sense that Sibelius had envisioned a career as a violin virtuoso from his adolescence until his early twenties. He auditioned for a position with the Vienna Philharmonic but was rejected. Sibelius felt crushed when he had to abandon his dream. “It was a very painful awakening when I had to admit that I had begun my training for the exacting career of a virtuoso too late,” he confessed.
Through the impressively varied personalities that Sibelius evokes from the violin in this concerto, he seems, on some level, to be trying to come to terms with that abandoned ambition—almost as if the composer is projecting an alter ego of his musical art as a concert violinist.
But the composition gave him difficulty, and the critical response after his initial version was premiered in 1904 led Sibelius to revise the concerto substantially. This version, introduced in 1905, is the one that, after a delay of some decades, would become among the most esteemed concertos in the repertoire.
The three-movement structure reflects the familiar concerto format: a large opening movement, which is followed by a lyrical and meditative movement and a high-energy finale. But Sibelius brings an innovative sensibility to this form through the substance and imaginative development of his musical ideas.
WHAT TO LISTEN FOR
The first movement is longer than the other two combined. Here, Sibelius’s dramatic writing for the violin sets the soloist in relief against the orchestra. In place of the animated conversation or heroic demeanor that we find in more conventional concertos, Sibelius develops his material in a more symphonic way.
The opening passage is particularly striking: as the orchestral violins shimmer in a softly muted D minor, the soloist comes into focus as if from a distance. Already, the solo violin is shown to follow a path of its own by launching into a small cadenza early on.
Another cadenza, gigantic in proportions, is situated where we would expect the development section of a traditional concerto to occur. Sibelius uses this cadenza and the reprise into which it leads to offer fresh perspectives on the material. An exciting sense of urgency in the coda brings this movement to a close.
The intimacy of the Adagio contrasts with the foregoing expansiveness. Sibelius explores how the violin’s character changes across different parts of its register. Tension enters in the middle of the movement, but the serene opening melody is reprised, now elaborated with intricate decorations.
The finale pulses forward with a thrilling rhythmic idea. Sibelius makes his most challenging demands of the soloist in this movement, but the virtuosity is intrinsic to the musical thought rather than a kind of icing applied on top.
Scored for piccolo, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, English horn, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion (cymbals, tambourine, and triangle), harp and strings
− Thomas May is the Nashville Symphony's program annotator.
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