Paganini: Violin Concertos Nos. 1 And 2

Description

NicoloPaganini (1782 - 1840)ViolinConcerto No.1 in D Major, Op. 6 ViolinConcerto No.2 in B Minor, Op. 7 Paganini'spopular reputation rested always on his phenomenal technique as a violinist, coupled witha showman's ability to dominate an audience and to stupefy those who heard him byastonishing feats of virtuosity. His playing served as an inspiration to other performersin the nineteenth century, suggesting to Chopin, in Warsaw, the piano Etudes, and to Lisztthe material of the Paganini studies that he w rote in 1838. The very appearance ofPaganini impressed people. His gaunt aquiline features, his suggestion of hunchedshoulders, his sombre clothing, gave rise to legends of association with the Devil, thealleged source of his power, an association supported by the frequent appearance by hisside on his travels of his secretary, one Harris, thought by some to be a familiar spiritor a Mephistopheles watching over his Faust. Stories of a pact with the Devil were deniedby Paganini himself, who, with characteristic understanding of the value of publicrelations in a more credulous age, told of an angelic visitation to his mother, in adream, foretelling his birth and his genius.Paganiniwas born in Genoa in 1782 and was taught the violin first by his father, an amateur, andthen by a violinist in the theatre orchestra and by the better known violinist GiacomoCosta, under whose tuition he gave a public performance in 1794. The following year heplayed to the violinist and teacher Alessandro Rolla in Parma, and on the latter'ssuggestion studied composition there under Paer. After a return to Genoa and removalduring the Napoleonic invasion, he settled in 1801 in Lucca, where, after 1805, he becamesolo violinist to the new ruler of Lucca, Princess Elisa Baciocchi, sister of Napoleon. Atthe end of 1809 he left to travel, during the next eighteen years, throughout Italy,winning a very considerable popular reputation. It was not until1828 that he made hisfirst concert tour abroad, visiting Vienna, Prague and then the major cities of Germany,followed by Paris and London in 1831. His international career as a virtuoso ended in1834, when, after an unsatisfactory tour of England, he returned again to Italy, to Parma.A return to the concert-hall in Nice and then, with considerable success, in Marseilles,was followed by an unsuccessful business venture in Paris, the Casino Paganini, which wasintended to provide facilities equally for gambling and for music. With increasing illhealth, he retired to Nice, where he died in 1840.The sixsurviving violin concertos of Paganini, part of the stock-in-trade of a travellingvirtuoso, were published posthumously, the last of them relatively recently. In generalthey follow the form of the romantic virtuoso concerto as developed by the violinistViotti and by Spohr, allowing the soloist music of operatic virtuosity, an opportunity fortechnical and musical display. Concerto No.1 in D major,written, in fact, in E flat major, but generall