Intermezzo from "F.A.E Sonata"ROBERT SCHUMANNBorn June 8, 1810, ZwickauDied July 29, 1856, Endenich

In the final years of his brief life, Robert Schumann served as mentor to a number of talented young musicians, among them Joseph Joachim. In the fall of 1853 Joachim was on a concert tour and was scheduled to give the première of Schumann's Fantasie for Violin and Orchestra in Düsseldorf of October 27. In anticipation of that visit, Schumann proposed an unusual project to two of his protegés, Albert Dietrich (1829-1908) and Johannes Brahms, then only twenty years old: the three of them would write a collaborative violin sonata for Joachim, basing its themes on the notes F-A-E. Those three letters came from Joachim's personal motto "Frei aber einsam": "Free but lonely." Dietrich wrote the first movement, Schumann the second and fourth, and Brahms the third. Presented with the sonata on his arrival in Düsseldorf, Joachim was asked to play the four movements of what was now called the  F.A.E Sonata and to identify the composer of each. He is reported to have played the music easily at sight (Clara Schumann played the piano on that occasion) and to have correctly guessed the composer of all four movements.

The subsequent history of this collaborative sonata was varied. Dietrich's movement essentially vanished. Brahms set his movement, a scherzo, aside, and its history is described in the next program note. For his part, Schumann recognized that his two movements constituted half a violin sonata. He discarded the movements by Dietrich and Brahms and very quickly wrote two more movements of his own, and by October 31 he had completed what now became his Third Violin Sonata. This sonata, one of Schumann's final compositions, has never become a part of the repertory; four months later, Schumann attempted suicide and was placed in the asylum where he would spend the final two years of his life. The original F.A.E. Sonata was not published until 1935, long after everyone involved in the project was dead.

This recital presents the Intermezzo from the F.A.E. Sonata-and from Schumann's Third Sonata. Very brief (just over three minutes in length), this movement might almost serve as a textbook example to illustrate the term "romantic." Over quietly-rippling piano accompaniment, the violin sings the main theme, built on three-note phrases. Schumann's music is rich, expressive, gentle, and dark, and it soon draws to a quiet close.

Biography:

Italian composer, violinist, and theorist. After receiving his early education from clerics at Pirano and Capodistria, he studied law at Padua University. In 1710 his secret marriage to Elisabetta Premazore caused him to incur the wrath of the Bishop of Padua Cardinal Giorgio Comaro, forcing him to take refuge in the Franciscan monastery at Assisi. There he is said to have studied with "Padre Boemo," probably the organist Bohuslav Cernohorsky. By 1714 he was employed in the opera orchestra at Ancona. About 1715 he was pardoned by the cardinal and was reunited with his wife, with whom he lived the following year in Venice and Padua. Probably in July 1716, he heard Veracini play in Venice and was so impressed with the virtuoso's violin technique that he is said to have gone into self-exile to perfect his own playing. By about 1720 he had returned to Venice, and on 16 April 1721 he was appointed "primo violino e capo di concerto" at St. Antonio in Padua; he retained this position until 1765. From June 1723 until 1726 he was employed by Count Kinsky at Prague; he then returned to Padua.

From the 1720s until about 1740, when he injured his arm at Bergamo, Tartini enjoyed remarkable success as a violinist. In 1727 or 1728 he founded his violin "school"; his pupils included J. G. Graun, Nardini, J. G. Naumann, Paganelli, and Pagin. He taught until at least 1767. His treatise on violin playing, Traité des agréments, appeared after his death, but it must have originated earlier, since material from it was used by Leopold Mozart in his Violinschule (1756).

Tartini published his acoustical findings in the Trattato di musica (Padua, 1754). His theoretical system incorporates the differential tone (terzo suono), which he claimed to have discovered in 1714. Also in the Trattato are discussions of melody, cadence types, dissonance, scale structure and harmonization, and meter. His compositions include a small number of sacred vocal pieces, written in the last year of his life; about 125 violin concertos; concertos for other instruments; numerous trio sonatas; and about 175 violin sonatas, including the "Trillo del Diavolo" [Devil'sTrill].

His Music

Violinists will know Italian composer Giuseppe Tartini as the man who introduced the concept of "resultant tone" in music, as well as introducing violinists to thicker strings and lighter bows than what was used up until his time. His technical proficiency on the instrument was well-known as demonstrated in this collection of transcriptions of seven of his sonatas. Written for solo violin with piano accompaniment, this compilation includes his Sonata in G Minor known throughout history as the Devil's Trill, so named because Tartini swore that the music came to him in a dream where the devil himself was playing the music.

Works:

Tartini published several treatises on musical theory:

Trattato di Musica secondo la vera scienza dell'Armonia (Padua, 1754) - acoustical findings. His theoretical system incorporates the differential tone (terzo suono) which he claimed to have discovered in 1714. Also in the Trattato are discussions of melody, cadence types, dissonance, scale structure and harmonization, and meter.

De' principi dell'armonia musicale nel diatonico genere (1767), transcribed in 1771 after his death, but it must have originated earlier, since material from it was used by Leopold Mozart in his Violinscule (1756).Traite des agrements (published posthumously in Paris in 1771).

Manuscript of the "Regole per suonare il violino".His compositions include more than 130 Concerti for violin, two Concerti for flute and two Cello concerti as well as over 170 Sonatas for violin, with or without continuo, some 50 Sonatas a Tre and 4 Sonatas a Quatre, plus a small number of sacral vocal pieces, written in the last year of his life. Only some 20 concerti and 50 sonatas were ever published so the remainder exist only in the forms of manuscripts. Apparently he was unconcerned with self-marketing, and many of his "programs" have only been reconstructed from private correspondence in the twentieth century. Tartini's use of a secret code was the source of much speculation until deciphered by Dounias, a Greek musicologist (1900-1962). His dissertation on Tartini's violin concertos (Die Violinkonzerte Giuseppe Tartinis, Wolfenbüttel, 1935) catalogued them according to tonality. The 'D' (Dounias) number does therefore not refer to the chronology of composition. Reasons for Tartini's use of a secret code are speculative, but it is likely that he used it to hide secular ideas from works played in church. Until Dounias deciphered the code in 1932 (using the now standard method of analysis of letter frequency), many outlandish theories were forwarded about the mystical qualities of what was written. The rather prosaic quotations from libretti by Pietro Metastasio came as a disappointment to many! The code is a simple substitution-cipher:Tartini's heritage is kept in a Piran museum and in the regional archives in Koper (Capodistria) and Izola (Isola). Due to the lack of chronology in the manuscripts, a catalogue of Tartini's concerti was drawn up by Minos Doumias, numbered according to their keys. It was possible for some of the works published during Tartini's lifetime to be dated a little more accurately and Doumias has divided the remainder on style, sorting the concerti into three main periods: prior to 1735, 1735-1750 and after 1750.His violin works are the repertoires of present-day violin virtuosi. One of his best known sonatas is Il trillo del diavolo (Vražji trilček, Devil's Trill or Devil's Sonata) which was published posthumously. It began with a dream that Tartini had in 1765 in which he made a pact with the devil.In the dream, Tartini, the greatest violin virtuoso of his time, handed his violin to the devil. Tartini tells us: "I heard a sonata so unusual and so beautiful performed with such mastery and intelligence, on a level I had never before conceived was possible! I was so overcome that I stopped breathing and awoke gasping. Immediately I seized my violin, hoping to recall some shred of what I had just heard - but in vain. The piece I then composed is without doubt my best, the Devil's Sonata, but it falls so far short of the one that stunned me that I would have smashed my violin and given up music forever if I could but possess it." The result is a wild bit of madness (keep in mind we're talking Baroque music here, not Black Sabbath) in three movements.Years before the dream, Tartini reputedly sliced up his hand in a fencing match and had to quit playing the violin. Frustrated by this, he took up composing and attracted young protégés from all over Europe, thus bringing to mind the phrase "those who can't do, teach." The Devil's Sonata is so treacherous that it almost seems to spite those who might dare attempt it. Andrew Manze, dubbed "the Grapelli of the Baroque," in his interpretation of this composition rips through this obstacle course of trills and finger stretches at lightning speed; he saws away with such vigor that occasionally the violin runs actually sound more like a burning bluegrass fiddle or a Hendrix guitar riff than a Baroque sonata, only to drop back into controlled quietude once again. The textures and mood changes that Manze pulls out of Tartini's work are phenomenal for such a short piece (the entire work is only 18 minutes). It's hair-raising, thrilling stuff due not only to the content of the work but to its insane, perfectionist execution.Selected recorded discography:

Until the arrival of the compact disc in 1983, much of Tartini's repertoire was difficult to locate on out of print LP records. A resurgence of interest in baroque music spearheaded by new original instrument recordings in the 1980s and 1990s has made a good selection of Tartini's music available.

Giuseppe Tartini (1692-1770) was a teacher, theorist, and composer who was one of the greatest violin virtuosos of the mid-eighteenth century. The majority of works were composed for his own instrument in the form of either concertos or sonatas with basso continuo. There are comfortably over 100 examples of the latter. The Sonata in G minor comes from a set of 12 first published by La Cène of Amsterdam in 1732 and reprinted in London in 1746. There are three movements, the first an Affettuoso whose sighing, pathetic opening doubtlessly gives the sonata its name, the work being one of a number of sonatas given programmatic titles by Tartini. The movement also includes music in the singing, cantabile style for which he was famed. The shorter succeeding movements are a Presto requiring extremely dexterous bowing over a wide range from the performer, and an Allegro in a dance rhythm that still manages to make the odd, expressive gesture.

Program notes by Eric Bromberger

Sonata in G Minor for Violin and Continuo “Devil’s Trill” (arr. Kreisler) Giuseppe TARTINI Born April 8, 1692, Pirano, SloveniaDied February 26, 1770, Padua, Italy

The life of Giuseppe Tartini reads like something out of a novel rather than a music history text. As a boy, he learned to play the violin and to fence and was so good at both that he supported himself at law school by giving violin and fencing lessons–he even thought briefly of making a career as a fencing-master. But fate intervened, as it so often does: at age 20, Tartini eloped with one of his violin students, only to discover that his youthful bride was under the protection of her uncle, the archbishop of Padua, who came after Tartini with a vengeance. The young violin-and-fencing teacher had to flee Padua for Assisi, where he hid in a monastery. Only after the archbishop had calmed down (which took two years) could Tartini return to Padua. He had used his time in the cloister to study composition, and he now devoted himself completely to music, becoming music director of Saint Anthony’s in Padua and eventually founding a violin school; this became so famous that it attracted students from all over Europe, earning it the nickname “School of the Nations.” A prolific composer (about 350 works survive), Tartini devoted himself to mathematical speculation and studies in musical theory during his later years.

His most famous work is the Violin Sonata in G Minor, which Tartini said was inspired when the devil appeared to him one night in a dream and played it through for him; the next day Tartini wrote down what he could remember of the sonata he had heard in his dream. The music acquired the nickname “Devil’s Trill” from the fiendishly-difficult trilled passages in its last movement–many is the violinist who, faced with having to play these passages, has been quite ready to agree that this music did in fact come straight from the devil. The sonata’s difficulties lie not just in the last movement’s famous trills, for the violinist must also be able to execute graceful string crossings, double-stops, quick grace notes, and the sudden alternation of a cantabile line with fiery attacks. Furthermore, the violin plays during every second of this music.

The “Devil’s Trill” is in three movements. The opening Larghetto affetuoso, somber and wistful, gives way to an Allegro that alternates dramatic gestures with fluid and flowing passages demanding the most poised bow arm possible. The famous last movement is actually two movements in one, for Tartini alternates the opening Grave and the Allegro assai, with its infamous trills. What makes these trills so difficult is that the violinist must simultaneously play a bowed melody on another string; near the close Tartini has the violinist break away for a long solo cadenza before a grand close on the Grave melody.

The “Devil’s Trill” is one of the great violin sonatas, but Tartini was not fully satisfied with it. Much later, he wrote to a friend: “The piece I then composed, ‘The Devil’s Sonata,’ although the best I ever wrote, how far was it below the one I heard in my dream!”

http://www.ljms.org/

Mozart's sonatas for keyboard and violin fall into four groups: those composed as a child in Paris, London and The Hague; seven written during the trip to Mannheim and Paris between 1777 and 1778; five composed in 1781; and an additional three dating from later in the 1780s. The present work belongs to the second of these sets, having been composed in Mannheim in the spring of 1778. The extant autograph provides a date of March 11, just three days before Mozart and his mother finally left Mannheim to continue their long delayed journey to Paris. It also informs us that the sonata was composed for "Mademoiselle Therese." Therese Pierron was the stepdaughter of Privy Court Councillor Pierron, and a piano pupil of Mozart's, who played one of the keyboard parts of the Concerto for three pianos, K. 242 in a farewell concert for him given on March 12. The composer had stayed in Pierron's house for some time during his stay in Mannheim. Like all Mozart's sonatas with violin, it was described as being for "piano and violin," not the other way around. This is an important distinction that helps to underline the fact that it is the piano that has the dominant role, a feature emphasized by Mozart when he came to publish the C major Sonata in Vienna in 1781 along with five more recently composed works (K. 376, and K. 377-380) as his "Opus 2." The title page of Artaria's publication announces the sonatas as being for "Harpsichord or Piano with the accompaniment of Violin." Despite this, all but the juvenile sonatas achieve a more equal balance between the two instruments than is the case with many contemporary works. There are three movements: Allegro Vivace, Andante sostenuto, and Rondeau.

http://www.allmusic.com/composition/sonata-for-violin-amp-piano-no-17-in-c-major-k-296-mc0002374757