Biography

Still in his twenties, Canadian violinist Blake Pouliot has established himself as a consummate 21st century artist. He studied in Canada with Marie Bérard and Erika Raum, and completed his training at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto. He has been praised by the Toronto Star as “one of those special talents that comes along once in a lifetime”. Pouliot’s debut album (music of Ravel and Debussy) was released on Analekta Records. It earned a five-star rating from BBC Music Magazine and a 2019 Juno Award nomination for Best Classical Album. Other important awards include the Grand Prize from the Montreal Symphony’s Manulife Competition, the Dorothy Delay Award, Grand Prize from the Canadian Federation of Music Festivals, and the Canada Council Michael Measures and Virginia Parker Prizes. Pouliot performs on a 1729 Guarneri del Gesu violin on loan from the Canada Council of the Arts. LMMC debut. The multi-talented Hsin-I Huang is one of today’s most sought-after pianists, a cellist who won numerous competitions in her native Taiwan before focusing on piano, and a conductor who served as Associate Conductor for a recent North-American tour of the Game of Thrones Live Concert Experience. LMMC debut.

https://www.blakepouliot.com/

Notes

Aside from the symphonies, Mozart wrote more violin sonatas than any other type of music. More than forty survive. Like the symphonies, most of the early works are of slight import, while the last dozen or so are masterpieces of their kind. K. 376 was composed in 1781, the year Mozart moved to Vienna. The sonata has a bright, cheerful, Haydnesque flavour.

Janáček’s music is steeped in the folk music idioms and speech patterns of his Moravian homeland. His unmistakable style is evident right from the opening moments of the sonata, where the violin plays a theme richly inflected with the characteristic contours of Moravian folk tunes, while the piano whirs and flutters in agitation below. The Ballada movement, a rondo, was originally part of one of Janáček’s lost student sonatas. The brief third movement is in ternary form (ABA) in the key of E flat minor (6 flats!). The Adagio finale is in traditional sonata form.

Prokofiev completed his first violin sonata in 1946. The premiere was given that year by its dedicatee, David Oistrakh, who also played two of the movements at the composer’s funeral in 1953. It is one of the darkest, most severe and intense compositions in Prokofiev’s catalogue, and a substantial work as well – four movements totaling half an hour, laid out in a slow-fast-slow-fast design. In the manner of true chamber music, the two instruments are equal partners, sharing musical ideas and engaging frequently in heated dialogues, debates and arguments.

Robert Markow