August 22, 2008 at 8:49 PM
Well, since Andrew Sords suggested it in a discussion thread earlier this week, I just couldn't resist.First, a little background: Tchaikovsky wrote his famous violin concerto in 1878, and when he offered it to the great violinist Leopold Auer, the violinist famously rejected it as "unplayable." The concerto was premiered three years later in Vienna, by Adolf Brodsky.
Auer eventually changed his mind about the concerto and became one of its biggest champions. He also revised it, and his revisions are what we are talking about today. There are small edits throughout the piece, but I'd like to focus on just two of the most obvious and bigger ones: one in the first movement and one in the last.
In the first movement, (after letter E, if you have your score), Auer wrote a double-stop scale lick to replace Tchaikovsky's barriolage passage. Here is an example of David Oistrakh playing the first movement with Tchaikovsky's original barriolage, which occurs 6:45 minutes in. Here is an example of Jascha Heifetz playing the first movement, with the Auer double stops in said passage, which occurs 5:09 minutes in.
In the third movement, towards the beginning, is the "tastefully repetitive" passage or the "broken record" passage, depending on how you look at it. Here is an example of Maxim Vengerov playing the third movement with the original Tchaikovsky repetitions, which occur 59 seconds into this recording. Here is an example of our very own Jessica Hung playing the third movement, with the Auer cuts, which occur 56 seconds in. (And by the way today on V.com "Concert Clips" we're featuring Judith Ingolfsson who does to the original Tchaik in the third movement. Beautiful playing!)
I listened to a few of my recordings, and made notes on who did and didn't do the aforementioned Auer cuts in the first movement, and in the third. Here are the results:
David Oistrakh, All-Union Radio Orchesta, 1939:
First movement: Auer double stops at letter E
Third movement: Auer cut, no repeats
Jascha Heifetz, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Reiner, 1957:
First movement: Auer double stops at letter E
Third movement: Auer cuts, no repeats
Joshua Bell, Cleveland Orchestra, Ashkenazy, 1988:
First movement: Tchaik barriolage at letter E
Third movement: Auer cuts, no repeats
Gil Shaham, Philharmonia Orchestra, Sinopoli, 1993:
First movement: Tchaikovsky barriolage at letter E
Third movement: Tchaikovsky repeats
Maxim Vengerov, Berliner Philharmoniker, Abbado, 1995:
First movement: Tchaikovsky barriolage at letter E
Third movement: Tchaikovsky repeats
How do you play it, or which do you prefer? Have your tastes or opinions changed on this matter over the years? Tell us about it!
If Tchaikovsky wrote this concerto and he liked it, then there must have been some reason. He was one of the greatest composers of all time, and why must someone change what he wrote? I personally also don't like the cuts.
I was taught to do the original in the 1st mvt, but the cuts in the 3rd.
My favorite recording is the Oistrakh/Konwitschny/Staatskapelle Dresden recording, on DG!
As for the last movement, surely the challenge is for the violinist - and the conductor/orchestra too - to make the repetition interesting in their interpretation - perhaps with some subtle variation in tone colour/bowing etc etc (not got my score to hand and too lazy to stand up and go look for it...!) so that the listener isn't "bored"? So no cuts for me please.
I also like the version with repetitions. The theme is so pretty that I like to hear it repeated. The repetition gives a sense of unification and a reassuring feeling that you can always go back to that place and it will always be good.
Jessica, you sound great!
I totally don't see the point of the repetitions, and it could be that I just heard it so many times the other way that I can't.
I would say this, though: no composer is perfect, and no work of music is complete without its performer. Music is meant to mutate!
If there was to be a recording someplace of Oistrakh, even the great and mighty Oistrakh, the climax would be DOA. Thank God Oistrakh didn't waste his years in the salon of Auer so he wasn't fed a bunch of trash that he would have probably unlearned later on like so many of the other star pupils of Auer's class did.
The original Tchaikovsky first movement is just about perfect when matching it to the most perfectly written music over the centuries and it has proven through time to be a favorite among all violin music lovers and casual listeners; and I'm quite certain that at that crucial half a minute nothing other than that which Tchaikovsky wrote can "do the trick!"
Of course the arrogance of Auer, to go and edit a work he had shoved in the composer’s face, is in itself unbelievable; on the one hand he’s too incompetent to play it and insults Tchaikovsky, whom I’m sure it dealt a great blow, knowing how sensitive and fragile a man he was, and on the other hand he takes unheard of liberties to SCREW IT UP!
That being said, I do understand his take on the finale, though I do not agree with them on a musicological footing. I heard the versions of the repetitions and I heard the versions of the Auer: if the violinist knows how to play he’ll play the original and it’ll sound marvelous; if he’s/she’s a hack—like most of the recorded violinists today—it won’t be worth the plastic it is burned upon either way.
But Auer created a problem in the first movement that is thankfully dead; something that can unfortunately not be said about, say, the Rococo Variations. Here too, some second rate hack, with nay his teeth in his mouth much less the marbles in his brain, who screwed up the work to the point that its musical integrity can never be the same due to confusion.
Wilhelm Fitzenhagen set the precedent to taking well thought out and well planned works of Tchaikovsky and butchering them. Look up the story and the effect it had on the ‘cello world; it still stirs controversy and nothing like this spat on the Auer revisions.
Re mov 1. Arpeggiating through barriolage is one of the violin's great sounds, and it spreads the harmonic content of those chords through time, giving the listener more time to hear what is going on. Heifetz is playing the Tchaik at a very high speed. Note that Heifetz also squashes the broken triplet chords into triple stops at the end of the Chacconne. I don't think he should have done.
Re mov 2. The repetition again allows the listener to hear the development of the piece. We need to be given fast material more than once if we are going to "get it", otherwise it slips past our ears and it might as well not have been written in the first place. Also, Vengerov plays the repeat with quite a different sound from the first statement.
With the cut, it sounds to me as though it has changed too soon.
All music is a balance between repetition and change. One of the composer's (and improviser's) hardest tasks is to decide how much repetition is needed before the listener gets bored, or when to change in order to keep the listener interested.
gc
This entry has been archived and is no longer accepting comments.
Violinist.com is made possible by...
Dimitri Musafia, Master Maker of Violin and Viola Cases
Johnson String Instrument/Carriage House Violins
Discover the best of Violinist.com in these collections of editor Laurie Niles' exclusive interviews.
Violinist.com Interviews Volume 1, with introduction by Hilary Hahn
Violinist.com Interviews Volume 2, with introduction by Rachel Barton Pine