Biography

In both art and life, violinist Rachel Barton Pine has an extraordinary ability to connect with people. She plays with passion and conviction across an extensive repertory, thrilling audiences with her dazzling technique, lustrous tone, and infectious joy in music-making. Her repertory ranges from traditional classical works to contemporary composers like the American Mohammed Fairouz and the Ghanian Kwabena Nketia. Her interests as well extend to period instrument practice (for which she uses a Baroque violin and viola d’amore), jazz, Celtic, folk, rock, and heavy metal. Pine’s prolific discography consists of more than thirty releases on the Avie, Cedille, Warner Classics, Hänssler Classics, Naxos, and Dorian labels. Her most recent releases include the Bach sonatas with keyboard, a Blues album of music by Black composers, and a pairing of the Dvořák and Khachaturian concertos. Pine holds prizes from several of the world’s leading competitions, including a gold medal at the 1992 J.S. Bach International Violin Competition in Leipzig. Other top awards have come from the Queen Elisabeth (Brussels, 1993), Kreisler (Vienna, 1992), Szigeti (Budapest, 1992), and Montreal (1991) International Violin Competitions. She performs on a Guarnerius del Gesù (1742) known as the “ex-Bazzini, ex-Soldat,” on lifetime loan from her patron. 4th LMMC appearance.

https://rachelbartonpine.com/

Notes

Aside from the symphony, Mozart wrote more violin sonatas than any other type of music. Over forty such works survive. The last dozen or so are masterpieces of their kind. K. 454 (1784) is one of the last, is the only one to open with a slow introduction, and fully demonstrates the equality of the two instruments.

Amanda Maier was one of the many excellent woman composers of the nineteenth and early-twentieth century who have been long neglected simply because they were not men. Maier was the first woman ever to earn the title of Director of Music from the Royal Swedish Academy of Music in 1873. She was admired by the likes of Brahms, Grieg, Reinecke, and Richter. The prize-winning Violin Sonata dates from 1874, when Maier was just 21 and furthering her studies in Leipzig. The influence of other Leipzig-associated composers like Mendelssohn, Schumann, and Reinecke is not hard to detect. The sonata-form first movement contains a restless, broadly flowing first theme and a sweetly lyrical second. The second movement is set to the gently swaying barcarolle rhythm, with a livelier central episode. A fiery opening subject serves as the main theme of the rondo-finale, which concludes in triumphant B major.

Amy Marcy Cheney Beach (alias Mrs. H.H.A. Beach) was America’s first important woman composer, and the first American woman composer to gain recognition in Europe (one of the first of either gender, actually). Beach dedicated the Romance to Maud Powell, the first American violinist to achieve international rank and a champion of both American and women composers. The six-minute piece develops a single theme, heard at the outset in the piano, then in the violin. True to its title, the Romance is infused with lyrical loveliness.

Respighi is best-known by far for his brilliantly orchestrated Roman trilogy, but he is also the composer of a substantial amount of chamber music. The Violin Sonata of 1917 found among its early champions Bronislav Huberman and Jascha Heifetz. The first movement is in traditional sonata form. Dense Brahmsian textures pervade the keyboard writing. In the central movement the piano sets up a gently rocking, asymmetrical accompaniment pattern against which the violin sings a lushly lyrical theme. For a finale, Respighi followed the example set by Brahms in his Fourth Symphony: he resurrected an obsolete form from the Baroque period, the passacaglia.

Robert Markow