VIOLIN CONCERTO ( Premiere 2. Nov. 2012 Dublin, National Concert Hall .
National Symphony Orchestra, Conductor: Christian Warren-Green,
Solist:
Alan Smale )
When tonight´s soloist, Alan Smale, approached me about composing yet another, my new Violin Concerto, he said one
thing: ” Sing it ! ”
To write a concerto for the ( tiny ) violin and (enormous) orchestra nowadays is not as easy as to cross a field. Yes, I have my three movements, – roughly Moderate / Slow / Fast – and they must ” sing it ! ” Beethoven´s, Mendelssohn´s, Brahms´s do. – Sing what ?
After the orchestral explosion of fortissimo brass and percussion at the beginning of My Very Own Orchestral Story, the soloist gives the game away ; it sings the opening exposition, theme, idea, melody,
really a scale of seven tones : G A flat C sharp D E flat F sharp A. I´ve often used them as my A B C in other, very different works. Why these ? Who knows ?
Here is ” melody” , but also, as
stacked or squashed or collected or heaped – up tones, ” harmony ” . Building-blocks as song .I have to write as melodically as Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Brahms. Alban Berg and György Ligeti, too. My ” collection” comes in a million guises, up , down, oblique, backwards,forwards transposed, invertd and so on.
Sing it. I use the ( not over- heavy – I´ve no tuba, not too much percussion, a harp, yes, in the lyrical Slow Movement ) orchestra as discrete accompaniment, as a foil to the leaping, darting, climbing , descending, singing human voice of the solo instrument, its joy and radiance and despair and roughness and cantability as my violin threads its line and lovely trellis-work up from the open G string to the highest regions of the E string.
String joy. Great energy ! Great . Sing it ! In this opening movement the short brass and wind chorales punctuate the violin´s Amhrán Mór, Great Song. Always my opening melodic idea and a second little ” lusingando” playfulness is the spiel . In the middle of this movement the
cadenza is ( – well, as it always is ) the soloist´s show-off acrobatics, the violinist painting his canvas with his sparkle of ideas, but they are all won from the opening tones ( as in Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Brahms… ) , all woven into the orchestral canvas.
The Second Movement is all melody ( But can we in this 21.st c. still compose a Lied ? Yes, we can ! ), lovely and ravishing . Four times comes this Lied ( built again from my seven building-blocks of that First Movement opening ) . In German ” Lied” ( “Song” ) is close to ” Leid” ( ” Suffering” ) . The central Cadenza distills the
very essence of both. Then, near the close, the violins have the singing before the soloist´s final lovely pizz. and sigh.
The final Third Movement has a Mozartian last movement energy with its forward movement of fast ( string ) semiquavers, it´s racing towards its end. ” In my end is my beginning” – it sums up, it quotes the First and Second Mov.s before
pitting itself again against strong orchestral forces, tiny David against his Goliathic orchestra, light and shadow and gossamer explosions and clouds and heavenly regions, the hole thing . The solo instrument has the last say, its last sigh rudely cut off by low celli and basses.
FRANK CORCORAN
—–Original Message—–
From: FBCorcoran@aol.com
Date: Wed, 18 Jul 2012 13:20:09 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: VIOLIn coNceRTO Prog. Note
To: fbcorcoran@aol.com, helena.plews@rte.ie, seamus.crimmins@rte.ie,
walter.branchi@libero.it, farrel.corcoran@dcu.ie
VIOLIN CONCERTO Frank Corcoran
When tonight´s soloist, Alan Smale, approached me about composing yet another, my new Violin Concerto, he said one
thing: ” Sing it ! ”
To write a concerto for the ( tiny ) violin and (enormous) orchestra nowadays is not as easy as to cross a field. Yes, I have my three movements, – roughly Moderate / Slow / Fast – and they must ” sing it ! ” Beethoven´s, Mendelssohn´s, Brahms´s do. – Sing what ?
After the orchestral explosion of fortissimo brass and percussion at the beginning of My Very Own Orchestral Story, the soloist gives the game away ; it sings the opening exposition, theme, idea, melody,
really a scale of seven tones : G A flat C sharp D E flat F sharp A. I´ve often used them as my A B C in other, very different works. Why these ? Who knows ?
Here is ” melody” , but also, as
stacked or squashed or collected or heaped – up tones, ” harmony ” . Building-blocks as song .I have to write as melodically as Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Brahms. Alban Berg and György Ligeti, too. My ” collection” comes in a million guises, up , down, oblique, backwards,forwards transposed, invertd and so on.
Sing it. I use the ( not over- heavy – I´ve no tuba, not too much percussion, a harp, yes, in the lyrical Slow Movement ) orchestra as discrete accompaniment, as a foil to the leaping, darting, climbing , descending, singing human voice of the solo instrument, its joy and radiance and despair and roughness and cantability as my violin threads its line and lovely trellis-work up from the open G string to the highest regions of the E string.
String joy. Great energy ! Great . Sing it ! In this opening movement the short brass and wind chorales punctuate the violin´s Amhrán Mór, Great Song. Always my opening melodic idea and a second little ” lusingando” playfulness is the spiel . In the middle of this movement the
cadenza is ( – well, as it always is ) the soloist´s show-off acrobatics, the violinist painting his canvas with his sparkle of ideas, but they are all won from the opening tones ( as in Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Brahms… ) , all woven into the orchestral canvas.
The Second Movement is all melody ( But can we in this 21.st c. still compose a Lied ? Yes, we can ! ), lovely and ravishing . Four times comes this Lied ( built again from my seven building-blocks of that First Movement opening ) . In German ” Lied” ( “Song” ) is close to ” Leid” ( ” Suffering” ) . The central Cadenza distills the
very essence of both. Then, near the close, the violins have the singing before the soloist´s final lovely pizz. and sigh.
The final Third Movement has a Mozartian last movement energy with its forward movement of fast ( string ) semiquavers, it´s racing towards its end. ” In my end is my beginning” – it sums up, it quotes the First and Second Mov.s before
pitting itself again against strong orchestral forces, tiny David against his Goliathic orchestra, light and shadow and gossamer explosions and clouds and heavenly regions, the hole thing . The solo instrument has the last say, its last sigh rudely cut off by low celli and basses.
FRANK CORCORAN
—–Original Message—–
From: FBCorcoran@aol.com
Date: Wed, 18 Jul 2012 13:31:18 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?FRANK=20CORCORAN=B4S=20new=20=20VIOLIN=20CONCERTO=20=20?=
=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=20=20=20=20=20=20=20Prog.=20Note?=
To: gerard.meulenberg@concertzender.nl
In einer eMail vom 18.07.2012 19:20:09 Westeuropäische Sommerzeit schreibt FBCorcoran@aol.com:
Hallo Gerard,
Who knows, perhaps something also for your Concertzender ?
Sincere ( and HOT ! ) Italian Greetings,
Frank Corcoran
VIOLIN CONCERTO ( Premiere 2. Nov. 2012 Dublin . N.S.O., Christian Warren-Green, Solist:
Alan Smale )
Frank Corcoran
When tonight´s soloist, Alan Smale, approached me about composing yet another, my new Violin Concerto, he said one
thing: ” Sing it ! ”
To write a concerto for the ( tiny ) violin and (enormous) orchestra nowadays is not as easy as to cross a field. Yes, I have my three movements, – roughly Moderate / Slow / Fast – and they must ” sing it ! ” Beethoven´s, Mendelssohn´s, Brahms´s do. – Sing what ?
After the orchestral explosion of fortissimo brass and percussion at the beginning of My Very Own Orchestral Story, the soloist gives the game away ; it sings the opening exposition, theme, idea, melody,
really a scale of seven tones : G A flat C sharp D E flat F sharp A. I´ve often used them as my A B C in other, very different works. Why these ? Who knows ?
Here is ” melody” , but also, as
stacked or squashed or collected or heaped – up tones, ” harmony ” . Building-blocks as song .I have to write as melodically as Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Brahms. Alban Berg and György Ligeti, too. My ” collection” comes in a million guises, up , down, oblique, backwards,forwards transposed, invertd and so on.
Sing it. I use the ( not over- heavy – I´ve no tuba, not too much percussion, a harp, yes, in the lyrical Slow Movement ) orchestra as discrete accompaniment, as a foil to the leaping, darting, climbing , descending, singing human voice of the solo instrument, its joy and radiance and despair and roughness and cantability as my violin threads its line and lovely trellis-work up from the open G string to the highest regions of the E string.
String joy. Great energy ! Great . Sing it ! In this opening movement the short brass and wind chorales punctuate the violin´s Amhrán Mór, Great Song. Always my opening melodic idea and a second little ” lusingando” playfulness is the spiel . In the middle of this movement the
cadenza is ( – well, as it always is ) the soloist´s show-off acrobatics, the violinist painting his canvas with his sparkle of ideas, but they are all won from the opening tones ( as in Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Brahms… ) , all woven into the orchestral canvas.
The Second Movement is all melody ( But can we in this 21.st c. still compose a Lied ? Yes, we can ! ), lovely and ravishing . Four times comes this Lied ( built again from my seven building-blocks of that First Movement opening ) . In German ” Lied” ( “Song” ) is close to ” Leid” ( ” Suffering” ) . The central Cadenza distills the
very essence of both. Then, near the close, the violins have the singing before the soloist´s final lovely pizz. and sigh.
The final Third Movement has a Mozartian last movement energy with its forward movement of fast ( string ) semiquavers, it´s racing towards its end. ” In my end is my beginning” – it sums up, it quotes the First and Second Mov.s before
pitting itself again against strong orchestral forces, tiny David against his Goliathic orchestra, light and shadow and gossamer explosions and clouds and heavenly regions, the hole thing . The solo instrument has the last say, its last sigh rudely cut off by low celli and basses.
FRANK CORCORAN
—–Original Message—–
From: FBCorcoran@aol.com
Date: Wed, 18 Jul 2012 13:20:09 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: VIOLIn coNceRTO Prog. Note
To: fbcorcoran@aol.com, helena.plews@rte.ie, seamus.crimmins@rte.ie,
walter.branchi@libero.it, farrel.corcoran@dcu.ie
VIOLIN CONCERTO Frank Corcoran
When tonight´s soloist, Alan Smale, approached me about composing yet another, my new Violin Concerto, he said one
thing: ” Sing it ! ”
To write a concerto for the ( tiny ) violin and (enormous) orchestra nowadays is not as easy as to cross a field. Yes, I have my three movements, – roughly Moderate / Slow / Fast – and they must ” sing it ! ” Beethoven´s, Mendelssohn´s, Brahms´s do. – Sing what ?
After the orchestral explosion of fortissimo brass and percussion at the beginning of My Very Own Orchestral Story, the soloist gives the game away ; it sings the opening exposition, theme, idea, melody,
really a scale of seven tones : G A flat C sharp D E flat F sharp A. I´ve often used them as my A B C in other, very different works. Why these ? Who knows ?
Here is ” melody” , but also, as
stacked or squashed or collected or heaped – up tones, ” harmony ” . Building-blocks as song .I have to write as melodically as Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Brahms. Alban Berg and György Ligeti, too. My ” collection” comes in a million guises, up , down, oblique, backwards,forwards transposed, invertd and so on.
Sing it. I use the ( not over- heavy – I´ve no tuba, not too much percussion, a harp, yes, in the lyrical Slow Movement ) orchestra as discrete accompaniment, as a foil to the leaping, darting, climbing , descending, singing human voice of the solo instrument, its joy and radiance and despair and roughness and cantability as my violin threads its line and lovely trellis-work up from the open G string to the highest regions of the E string.
String joy. Great energy ! Great . Sing it ! In this opening movement the short brass and wind chorales punctuate the violin´s Amhrán Mór, Great Song. Always my opening melodic idea and a second little ” lusingando” playfulness is the spiel . In the middle of this movement the
cadenza is ( – well, as it always is ) the soloist´s show-off acrobatics, the violinist painting his canvas with his sparkle of ideas, but they are all won from the opening tones ( as in Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Brahms… ) , all woven into the orchestral canvas.
The Second Movement is all melody ( But can we in this 21.st c. still compose a Lied ? Yes, we can ! ), lovely and ravishing . Four times comes this Lied ( built again from my seven building-blocks of that First Movement opening ) . In German ” Lied” ( “Song” ) is close to ” Leid” ( ” Suffering” ) . The central Cadenza distills the
very essence of both. Then, near the close, the violins have the singing before the soloist´s final lovely pizz. and sigh.
The final Third Movement has a Mozartian last movement energy with its forward movement of fast ( string ) semiquavers, it´s racing towards its end. ” In my end is my beginning” – it sums up, it quotes the First and Second Mov.s before
pitting itself again against strong orchestral forces, tiny David against his Goliathic orchestra, light and shadow and gossamer explosions and clouds and heavenly regions, the hole thing . The solo instrument has the last say, its last sigh rudely cut off by low celli and basses.
FRANK CORCORAN
