For me, the name “Stravisky” is thoroghly associated with amazing orchestral and ballet music. However, he composed other music that is less well known.
The relationship between Igor Stravinsky and the violin didn’t get off to a promising start: early on in his career the composer stated that he was not fond of stringed instruments, finding them ‘rich in cheap expressivity’. He was also suspicious of virtuoso interpreters – among which violinists were particularly numerous – and their tendency to ‘seek immediate triumphs and to lend themselves to the wishes of the public’.
Nevertheless there are in Stravinsky’s compositions a number of works featuring a solo violin, all of which have now been recorded by his compatriot Ilya Gringolts.
The focus of an earlier recording was on the works for violin and piano, most of them Stravinsky’s arrangements of his own music for the stage. On the present CD, Gringolts combines duos with other genres, including Stravinsky’s most famous work for the violin: his Violin Concerto from 1931. In the concerto, as in the extract for solo violin and strings from the ballet Apollon musagète, Gringolts is supported by Orquesta Sinfónica de Galicia conducted by Dima Slobodeniouk.
Here is the violin concerto by Igor Stravinsky, as performed by Gil Shaham:
