Rachmaninoff cello sonata history

Rachmaninoff cello sonata program notes
Rachmaninov cello concerto
Rachmaninoff cello sonata analysis

•

Julius Isserlis

Russian pianist and composer

Julius Isserlis (26 October (OS) / 7 November 1888 – 23 July 1968) was a pianist and composer.

He was born in Kishinev, Russian Empire (now Chișinău, Republic of Moldova), to a Jewish family. His father was cantor in a synagogue, and also worked as an itinerant dentist; his mother was a midwife. He started playing the piano at the age of four, and showed such precocity that he was entered into the Kiev Conservatory when he was nine; but his professor there, Włodzimierz Puchalski, soon sent him to Moscow to study with Vasily Safonov at the Moscow Conservatory. Here he also studied composition, under Sergei Taneyev. He graduated at the age of sixteen, winning the gold medal of the Conservatory.^[1]

In 1907 Isserlis travelled to Paris to take lessons from Charles-Marie Widor. He made a brief trip to the United States, playing a concert in the Carnegie Hall, New York (having been recommended as a soloist by Alexander Scriabin). Returning to the Russian Empire, he was appointed as a professor at the College of the Imperia

•

The mystic aspect to Rachmaninov’s art can be felt strongly throughout his Cello Sonata, his most famous piece of chamber music. While there are no obvious quotations from any Orthodox hymns, the style of many of the themes, with their close intervals, their incense-filled colours, the passionate, almost obsessive repetition of single notes (particularly in the main theme of the slow movement), and the frequent bell-like sonorities, owe a huge debt to the music of the Russian Church that was such an important influence on the composer’s life. Written in 1901, the year after the perennially beloved Second Piano Concerto, the Cello Sonata reflects, perhaps, the state of Rachmaninov’s heart and mind. Having suffered a nervous breakdown after the catastrophic failure of his First Symphony in 1897, Rachmaninov had fought his way back to mental and creative health. Surely it is not fanciful to hear an echo of this in the struggles of the first movement, with its conflict between semitones and whole tones; in the dark night of the Scherzo; and then in the blazing joy of

•

Program: Isserlis and Shih: cello sonatas by Shostakovich, Kabalevsky and Rachmaninov, from Tokyo

Acclaimed worldwide for his profound musicianship and technical mastery, British cellist Steven Isserlis enjoys a uniquely varied career as a soloist, chamber musician, educator, author and broadcaster.

He appears with the world's leading orchestras and conductors and in 2022 appeared in concert in Tokyo with pianist Connie Shih.

The Canadian pianist is considered to be one of Canada's most outstanding artists. In 1993 she was awarded the Sylva Gelber Award for most outstanding classical artist under age 30. At the age of nine, she made her orchestral debut with Mendelssohn's first Piano Concerto with the Seattle Symphony Orchestra.

The concert of cello sonatas by Shostakovich, Kabalevsky and Rachmaninov, at Oji Hall, Tokyo, Japan.

Live concert recording from Oji Hall, Tokyo, Japan on September 14th, 2022 courtesy of Euroradio.

Program

Dmitri Shostakovich: Cello Sonata in D minor
Dmitri Borisovich Kabalevsky: Cello Sonata in B flat
Serge Rachmaninov: Cello