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JW is writing a new violin concerto for Anne-Sophie Mutter - "Violin Concerto No. 2"


Matthias

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Anne-Sophie was just diagnosed with the Corona virus. She posted a video on Facebook. She seems in good spirits, just described feeling lazy.

 

https://www.facebook.com/annesophiemutter/videos/1278304599033992/

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Let us wish her to get well in a couple of weeks - let us hope for the best.

 

She made us feel so wonderful a couple of months ago,

but we cannot help her feel wonderful again.

 

/me raises glass.

 

To ASM!

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Coughing isnt neccessarily are indication of COVID-2019 

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8 hours ago, Will said:

I wonder what prompted ASM to get tested... She didn't seem to be coughing in that video. 

 

 

 

The amount of travelling she did in the last few weeks, I'd reckon

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Off topic but did anyone see Anne-Sophie Mutter's facebook video? Apparently she has revealed that she also tested positive for COVID-19. Hoping she recovers quickly and gets well soon. 

 

 

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Sad and concerned about all this. Im sure our Maestro himself is taking extra extra care at his age. Im sure he is spending quality time working at the piano keeping himself busy.  😊

 

And wishing everyone  here safe health. As a banker managing a Contact Center I have to ensure all necessary precautions despite coming to work in my office with a  major lock down in my city. Its a lot of risk but the support is essential. 

 

Be safe, everyone else. 

 

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On 3/27/2020 at 7:33 PM, Tom said:

Let's face it, if Williams daily routine is as he states in his interviews, the man has been practicing social distancing since long before the rest of us were born.  

 

Let's just hope Daisy keeps her distance.

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  • 1 year later...
9 hours ago, filmmusic said:

I just hope it's more post-romantic than atonal...

 

Indeed. Between his first violin concerto and "Markings", I would hope and expect that to be the case for this too.

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Just now, carlborg said:

Wouldn't this technically be VC no. 3? Because of Treesong?

 

He's done plenty of cello pieces beyond TREESONG without them being called concertos. I'm guessing there would be parameters in play in order to call it that?

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10 hours ago, filmmusic said:

I just hope it's more post-romantic than atonal...


His concerto no. 1 is atonal but very romantic in my mind. Or do you mean something like Treesong?

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16 minutes ago, Remco said:


His concerto no. 1 is atonal but very romantic in my mind. Or do you mean something like Treesong?

 

I would not call the violin concerto atonal by any stretch of the imagination. It's a cross between a romantic language and a modernistic, but doesn't really venture into the atonal.

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28 minutes ago, Remco said:


His concerto no. 1 is atonal but very romantic in my mind. Or do you mean something like Treesong?

I meant something in the vein of Elegy for cello.

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Do you think it will be long until we get a recording to listen to after the concert? Does the DSO record/broadcast or anything of the sort?

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I'm hoping for an eventual album with the two violin concertos and treesong (runtime permitting).

 

2 hours ago, Thor said:

 

He's done plenty of cello pieces beyond TREESONG without them being called concertos. I'm guessing there would be parameters in play in order to call it that?

 

Technically it would qualify, being an extended work for soloist and orchestra in 3 movements (side note, are you confusing Treesong with Heartwood? Since the latter is for cello, and in one movement). But a composer is free to call his works what he likes, and "concerto" also carries some connotations of scope, so he may see Treesong as more of an impressionistic (in a loose sense of the word) fantasy or meditation, compared with the more ambitious scope of e.g. the first violin concerto.

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3 minutes ago, ChrisAfonso said:

I'm hoping for an eventual album with the two violin concertos and treesong (runtime permitting).

 

 

Technically it would qualify, being an extended work for soloist and orchestra in 3 movements (side note, are you confusing Treesong with Heartwood? Since the latter is for cello, and in one movement). But a composer is free to call his works what he likes, and "concerto" also carries some connotations of scope, so he may see Treesong as more of an impressionistic (in a loose sense of the word) fantasy or meditation, compared with the more ambitious scope of e.g. the first violin concerto.

 

No, I was thinking about TREESONG. Personally, I don't really consider it a concerto unless it's actually CALLED a concerto. But maybe that's just me.

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1 hour ago, Thor said:

 

I would not call the violin concerto atonal by any stretch of the imagination. It's a cross between a romantic language and a modernistic, but doesn't really venture into the atonal.

 

The concerto is atonal by definition of JW himself in the description of the piece, which is technically true, as it doesn't have a set key signature (C major, D minor, F Sharp major etc), but it moves freely, like much of contemporary orchestral music.

 

Also, Williams described the style of the piece as "romantic atonality" in an interview from the 1980s.

 

 

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Well, it's certainly not my idea of atonal, the way I've been taught the term. Dissonance? Sure, there's some of that. But not atonal in the Webern/Schoenberg/Berg sense.

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11 minutes ago, Jurassic Shark said:

There's many ways to be atonal. As Townerfan touched upon, atonal only means there's no tonal center.

 

Yes, that's the broader definition. I think I was leaning more towards a narrower one.

 

In the liner notes of the ol' Slatkin recording, Williams merely says "although contemporary in style and technique, I think of the piece as within the romantic tradition".

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It will probably be in line with the first concerto.  However, I could see Mutter pushing him toward something closer to the style of the arrangements he wrote for her--at least in terms of stronger melodic lines.  I suppose we will find out soon enough.  

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1 hour ago, Thor said:

Yes, that's the broader definition. I think I was leaning more towards a narrower one.

 

In the liner notes of the ol' Slatkin recording, Williams merely says "although contemporary in style and technique, I think of the piece as within the romantic tradition".

 

Atonal literally means having no tonal center or established key signature. This means that the music moves freely between different tonal gravity points, but not necessarily that it sounds dissonant or discordant. Yes, it often produces highly chromatic writing, as the composer is free to change key literally at any moment, so the result is quite often unpredictable and more difficult for the ear accustomed to traditional tonal chord progressions. Perhaps "polytonal" would be a better word to use.

 

I'm pretty sure Williams described the work as atonal in one of his introductory notes for some concert or recording.

 

1 hour ago, Thor said:

Well, it's certainly not my idea of atonal, the way I've been taught the term. Dissonance? Sure, there's some of that. But not atonal in the Webern/Schoenberg/Berg sense.

 

I think you're mixing atonality with serialism, or 12-tone writing, which is a specific thing of its own.

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18 minutes ago, TownerFan said:

 

Atonal literally means having no tonal center or established key signature. This means that the music moves freely between different tonal gravity points, but not necessarily that it sounds dissonant or discordant. Yes, it often produces highly chromatic writing, as the composer is free to change key literally at any moment, so the result is quite often unpredictable and more difficult for the ear accustomed to traditional tonal chord progressions. Perhaps "polytonal" would be a better word to use.

 

There isn't only one set interpretation of 'atonal'. Mine is apparently more specific than just the absence of a tonal centre; it also deals with a particular form of chromatic writing - something far more alienating than the largely romantic violin concerto. IMAGES has atonal elements.

 

Quote

I think you're mixing atonality with serialism, or 12-tone writing, which is a specific thing of its own.

 

Not at all. But 'atonal' is frequently used to describe the 12-tone music of the aforementioned composers.

 

Guess the point is that it's a term with some interpretation involved. People are free to call the violin concerto atonal. I don't.

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1 hour ago, Tom said:

It will probably be in line with the first concerto.  However, I could see Mutter pushing him toward something closer to the style of the arrangements he wrote for her--at least in terms of stronger melodic lines.  I suppose we will find out soon enough.  

 

Mutter has been a long term champion of contemporary music and has had works written for her by almost every notable modern composer. She's had her set of film-melodic Williams pieces with Across the Stars. If anything, I'd expect her to push for a less melodic/"traditional" concerto.

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We can go back and forth on this forever, Maurizio.

 

I get what you're saying, and I have no problem with you (or Williams himself, for that matter) defining the violin concerto as atonal. In my world, and the rather specific way I've been taught to use the word atonality, however, it doesn't make sense.

 

I group his violin concerto among the handful of accessible, romantic, largely tonal works that also encompass the tuba concerto, the elegy, Five Sacred Trees. Obviously the fanfares, but I don't count those.

 

Vice versa, I group works like the flute concerto, the sinfonietta, Conversations, the scherzo for piano and orchestra, the duo concertante as leaning more towards, or at least flirting with, atonality.

 

I need to keep it that way in order for my brain not to explode, music scholars be damned. ;)

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1 hour ago, Marian Schedenig said:

 

Mutter has been a long term champion of contemporary music and has had works written for her by almost every notable modern composer. She's had her set of film-melodic Williams pieces with Across the Stars. If anything, I'd expect her to push for a less melodic/"traditional" concerto.

I would agree that this is likely.  However, I do remember one of the interviews with her toward the beginning of the arrangement project, she remarked that Williams should write more concert works because of his gift of melody.  Plus, he wrote Markings for her, and then she pushed for the film arrangements, and then concerto (man, she really has taken up months of his composing time in the last couple of years).  All that being said, I am sure Williams wrote whatever he wanted to write.  

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39 minutes ago, Thor said:

We can go back and forth on this forever, Maurizio.

 

I get what you're saying, and I have no problem with you (or Williams himself, for that matter) defining the violin concerto as atonal. In my world, and the rather specific way I've been taught to use the word atonality, however, it doesn't make sense.

 

I group his violin concerto among the handful of accessible, romantic, largely tonal works that also encompass the tuba concerto, the elegy, Five Sacred Trees. Obviously the fanfares, but I don't count those.

 

Vice versa, I group works like the flute concerto, the sinfonietta, Conversations, the scherzo for piano and orchestra, the duo concertante as leaning more towards, or at least flirting with, atonality.

 

I need to keep it that way in order for my brain not to explode, music scholars be damned. ;)

 

No problem, I understand your stance. I too often used the term atonal to define dissonant or discordant music. However, music theory can really be a true ally when you start diving into it :)

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