How did I happen to land on Paganini this week? I saw a couple of Paganini memes on Instagram, and that reminded me of a sculpture I had seen several years ago at the Hirschhorn Museum called “To Hell With Paganini” by Arman, a French-born American artist. Below left and center: Two Paganini memes. Below right: "To Hell with Paganini" by Arman.
How did I like it? Well, as you can see by my rating above, I did enjoy it, but I don’t think that it’s a piece I will revisit very often. Oddly enough, from the opening chord and throughout much the piece, I thought I was listening to the music of a lesser-known Gilbert and Sullivan operetta – as if the orchestra had played a G&S overture, and then the violin presented the highlights of arias by Little Buttercup, Iolanthe, or a Modern Major Violinist – er, General. The orchestral introduction sounded so Gilbert-and-Sullivan-esque to me that I actually looked up some dates to see if Paganini could have been influenced by their work, but that is not the case. Paganini lived from October 1782 to May 1840, and he wrote this concerto in 1817 or 1818. Gilbert & Sullivan’s first operetta, Thespis, premiered in December 1871. I also heard hints of Rossini in the concerto (listen at 4:39 in the video, for example) so I also checked out his dates. Rossini lived from February 1792 until November 1868, so it is entirely possible that Rossini influenced Paganini. If not inspired by Rossini, then Paganini was most certainly influenced by the popular Bel Canto style of the time. At times, the concerto seemed nothing more than a violin solo with an orchestra as background accompaniment – and yes, I know that, by definition, that is what a concerto is. However, in this case, the orchestra and solo instrument never integrate to the point where the two blend to create a profound musical experience – say, like the Rach 2 for piano or the Grieg Piano Concerto in A Minor.
Anyway, as I stated above, I did enjoy the piece, but as violin concertos go, it was not as imposing as the Tchaikovsky, as dramatic as the Mendelssohn, or as beautiful as the Beethoven. Oddly, enough, shortly after I’d listened to this work, I found this article, “Best Violin Concertos: Greatest Top 10,” HERE – and guess what was on it?
No, not the Paganini Violin Concerto No. 1. However, in the 7th place spot was the Paganini Violin Concerto No. 2 in B Minor. Go figure! I suppose I’ll listen to that soon!
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A New Hope:As the header above says, each week I will listen to a piece of classical music that I've never heard before, and then I will report out what I thought about it. Archives
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