Concerto for orchestra of Bartók

History

Composition

In 1940, Béla Bartók, fleeing the Nazisme arrives at the the United States. It is not happy there, not appreciating the country, being vis-a-vis serious financial problems and, especially, badly supporting the distance of its country. As of the end of 1942, a leukemia is diagnosed to him; it must then give up its concerts.

Whereas he refuses the financial aid of his friends, the Company of the American authors deals with it and, thanks to the leader Serge Koussevitzky, a new work orders to him. It will be the Concerto for orchestra, to which he worked from August in October 1943. The first took place in Boston in December 1944 with the Symphony orchestra of Boston, it wrote: “… the execution was excellent. Koussevitzky is very enthusiastic about the piece, and indicates that it is “the best the 25 last years orchestral piece””.

Analyzes

The term of Concerto implies since the 18th century an instrument Soliste with the Orchestre accompanying it. But one can carry to the credit of Béla Bartók to have invented a model with this Concerto for orchestra . Here, each group is treated in a concerting way making watch of its virtuosity: in the fugato of the first movement (coppers), the main theme of the last movement (cords) or the second movement in which the pairs of instruments consecutively exchange the brilliant passages (first of all, after an introduction of clear Caisse, two Basson S goguenards with the Sixte, then two Hautbois caqueteurs with the third , two voluble Clarinette S with the seventh, two Flûte S clear and transparent with the Quinte, and finally two stopped Trompette S, which nasillent with the second).

Béla Bartók foot-note in connection with the Concerto for orchestra: “The general atmosphere of the work - put aside the second movement - presents a gradual progression going of the austerity of the first movement and the lugubrious song of died of the third towards the assertion of the vitality of the last…”

As for Ernest Ansermet, he said the Final one that “he runs to the coded, one coded vertiginous: like a great strong gale, waves of cords to the phosphorescent colors seem to carry bits of the running away until the topic of this one bursts in all its size with coppers”.

Orchestration

3 flutes (3e=piccolo), 3 oboes (English 3e=cor), 3 clarinets (3e=clarinette low), 3 bassoons (3e=contrebasson); 4 horns, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, 1 tuba
drinking cups and percussion (cymbals, tom-tom, triangle, large case, clear case
2 toothings-stone
cords

Execution time

38 minutes

Discography

The first version is that of Serge Koussevitzky in 1944 (recording in a radiophonic concert makes less than one month after the creation of work). In 2007, there exists more than one about sixty recordings of the concerto.

References (only are quoted there the preceded recordings):

Fritz Reiner and the Symphony orchestra of Chicago, a directed superb orchestra of iron hand
Leonard Bernstein and the Philharmonic orchestra of New York
Ferenc Fricsay and the Symphony orchestra of the radio of Berlin, into mono (1951) but this version is the reference for its constant imagination, its spirit, its colors
Evgueni Mravinski and the Philharmonic orchestra of Leningrad
Georg Solti and the Symphony orchestra of London, dark and energetic
Antal Doráti and the Symphony orchestra of London, shining and virtuoso
Iván Fischer and the Orchestra of the festival of Budapest, a beautiful ignored orchestra which emphasizes specifically Hungarian colors

Outsiders:

Karel Ančerl and the Czech, elegant and refined Philharmonic orchestra but with a sometimes disappointing orchestra
György Lehel and the Czech Philharmonic orchestra, into live, in an option " poem symphonique" romantic
Herbert von Karajan and the Philharmonic orchestra of Berlin, sound brightness and depth of the vision
Sergiu Celibidache and the Philharmonic orchestra of Munich construction and déconstruction of the sound, vast and full meditation
Pierre Boulez and the Chicago Symphony Orchestrated an incomparable richness in sonorities and the tempos, a demonstration of direction by Pierre Boulez

External bonds

History of work by Radio France

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