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Violin Concerto No. 2 (Glass)
Philip Glass' Violin Concerto No. 2, titled ''The American Four Seasons'', received its world premiere in Toronto on December 9, 2009, with violinist Robert McDuffie, for whom the work was composed, and the Toronto Symphony Orchestra under conductor Peter Oundjian. Its European premiere was in London on April 17, 2010, with McDuffie and the London Philharmonic Orchestra under conductor Marin Alsop. Glass composed the work in the summer and autumn of 2009 after several years of exchanges between him and McDuffie with the idea of creating a piece that would serve as a companion to Vivaldi's '' The Four Seasons''. When the work was presented to McDuffie, it emerged that his interpretation of the seasons was somewhat different from Glass'. For this reason, Glass presents this as an opportunity for the listener to make his/her own interpretation. The titles of the movements therefore offer no clues as to where Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter might fall, with the composer welcoming ot ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Philip Glass
Philip Glass (born January 31, 1937) is an American composer and pianist. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century. Glass's work has been associated with minimal music, minimalism, being built up from repetitive phrases and shifting layers. Glass describes himself as a composer of "music with repetitive structures", which he has helped evolve stylistically. Glass founded the Philip Glass Ensemble, with which he still performs on keyboards. He has written fifteen operas, numerous chamber operas and musical theatre works, fourteen symphony, symphonies, twelve concertos, nine string quartets and various other chamber music, and several film scores. Three of his film scores have been nominated for an Academy Award. Life and work 1937–1964: Beginnings, early education and influences Philip Glass was born in Baltimore, Maryland, on January 31, 1937, the son of Ida (née Gouline) and Benjamin Charles Glass. His family were Lithuanian Je ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Prelude (music)
A prelude (german: Präludium or '; la, praeludium; french: prélude; it, preludio) is a short Musical piece, piece of music, the musical form, form of which may vary from piece to piece. While, during the Baroque era, for example, it may have served as an introduction to succeeding movements of a work that were usually longer and more complex, it may also have been a stand-alone piece of work during the Romantic era. It generally features a small number of rhythmic and melodic Motif (music), motifs that recur through the piece. Stylistically, the prelude is improvisatory in nature. The term may also refer to an overture, particularly to those seen in an opera or an oratorio. History The first preludes to be Musical notation, notated were Organ repertoire, organ pieces that were played to introduce church music, the earliest surviving examples being five brief ''praeambula'' in the Ileborgh Tablature of 1448. These were closely followed by freely composed preludes in an Mus ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Violin Concertos By Philip Glass
The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular use. The violin typically has four strings (some can have five), usually tuned in perfect fifths with notes G3, D4, A4, E5, and is most commonly played by drawing a bow across its strings. It can also be played by plucking the strings with the fingers (pizzicato) and, in specialized cases, by striking the strings with the wooden side of the bow (col legno). Violins are important instruments in a wide variety of musical genres. They are most prominent in the Western classical tradition, both in ensembles (from chamber music to orchestras) and as solo instruments. Violins are also important in many varieties of folk music, including country music, bluegrass music, and in jazz. Electric violins with solid bodies and piezoelectric pickups ar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Synthesizer
A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and frequency modulation synthesis. These sounds may be altered by components such as filters, which cut or boost frequencies; envelopes, which control articulation, or how notes begin and end; and low-frequency oscillators, which modulate parameters such as pitch, volume, or filter characteristics affecting timbre. Synthesizers are typically played with keyboards or controlled by sequencers, software or other instruments, and may be synchronized to other equipment via MIDI. Synthesizer-like instruments emerged in the United States in the mid-20th century with instruments such as the RCA Mark II Sound Synthesizer, RCA Mark II, which was controlled with Punched card, punch cards and used hundreds of vacuum tubes. The Moog synthesizer, d ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
String Instrument
String instruments, stringed instruments, or chordophones are musical instruments that produce sound from vibrating strings when a performer plays or sounds the strings in some manner. Musicians play some string instruments by plucking the strings with their fingers or a plectrum—and others by hitting the strings with a light wooden hammer or by rubbing the strings with a bow. In some keyboard instruments, such as the harpsichord, the musician presses a key that plucks the string. Other musical instruments generate sound by striking the string. With bowed instruments, the player pulls a rosined horsehair bow across the strings, causing them to vibrate. With a hurdy-gurdy, the musician cranks a wheel whose rosined edge touches the strings. Bowed instruments include the string section instruments of the orchestra in Western classical music (violin, viola, cello and double bass) and a number of other instruments (e.g., viols and gambas used in early music from the Baro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Violin
The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular use. The violin typically has four strings (music), strings (some can have five-string violin, five), usually tuned in perfect fifths with notes G3, D4, A4, E5, and is most commonly played by drawing a bow (music), bow across its strings. It can also be played by plucking the strings with the fingers (pizzicato) and, in specialized cases, by striking the strings with the wooden side of the bow (col legno). Violins are important instruments in a wide variety of musical genres. They are most prominent in the Western classical music, Western classical tradition, both in ensembles (from chamber music to orchestras) and as solo instruments. Violins are also important in many varieties of folk music, including country music, bluegrass music, and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gidon Kremer
Gidon Kremer ( lv, Gidons Krēmers; born 27 February 1947) is a Latvian classical violinist, artistic director, and founder of Kremerata Baltica. Life and career Gidon Kremer was born in Riga. His father was Jewish and had survived the Holocaust. His mother had German-Swedish origins. His grandfather Karl Brückner was a well-known musicologist and violinist in Riga. He began playing the violin at the age of four, receiving instruction from his father and his grandfather, who were both professional violinists. He went on to study at the Riga School of Music, where his teacher was mainly Voldemar Sturestep (Voldemārs Stūresteps). From 1965, Kremer studied with David Oistrakh at the Moscow Conservatory. In 1967, he won third prize at the Queen Elisabeth Music Competition in Brussels. In 1969, he won second prize at the Montreal International Violin Competition (shared with Oleh Krysa), followed by first prize at the Paganini Competition in Genoa, and finally first prize agai ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kremerata Baltica
Kremerata Baltica is a chamber music, chamber orchestra consisting of musicians from Baltic countries (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania). It was founded by Latvian violinist Gidon Kremer in 1997. Gidon Kremer is an artistic director of Kremerata Baltica. Description Kremerata Baltica first appeared on stage of Austria's Lockenhaus Chamber Music Festival and since then has become well known for its energy and joy in playing. The orchestra was formed as an educational project promoting the cultural life of the Baltics. By Los Angeles Times they were described as "extraordinary young players ... [who] animate everything their bows touch.” Kremerata Baltica performs around 70 concerts annually during tours throughout Europe, Asia, and the Americas. Regular performances are held in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, United Kingdom, Japan, the United States of America, and other countries concert halls like Carnegie Hall (USA), Schloss Neuhardenberg, Schloss Elmau, Philharmonie im Gasteig in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cadenza
In music, a cadenza (from it, cadenza, link=no , meaning cadence; plural, ''cadenze'' ) is, generically, an improvisation, improvised or written-out ornament (music), ornamental passage (music), passage played or sung by a solo (music), soloist or soloists, usually in a "free" rhythmic style, and often allowing virtuoso, virtuosic display. During this time the accompaniment will rest, or sustain a note or chord. Thus an improvised cadenza is indicated in written notation by a fermata in all parts. A cadenza will usually occur over the final or penultimate note in a piece, the lead-in (german: Eingang, link=no) or over the final or penultimate note in an important subsection of a piece. It can also be found before a final coda (music), coda or ritornello. In concerti The term ''cadenza'' often refers to a portion of a concerto in which the orchestra stops playing, leaving the soloist to play alone in free time (music), free time (without a strict, regular pulse) and can be wr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert McDuffie
Robert McDuffie is an American violinist. He has played as a soloist with many of the major orchestras around the world including those of New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Montreal, Toronto, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Cleveland, Minnesota, Houston, St. Louis, Hamburg Symphony Orchestra, Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, the North German Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Frankfurt Radio Orchestra, the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, Orchestra del Teatro alla Scala, Santa Cecilia Orchestra of Rome as well as the major orchestras of Australia and East Asia. McDuffie has appeared on A&E's ''Breakfast with the Arts'', ''CBS News Sunday Morning'', NBC's ''The Today Show'', PBS's ''Charlie Rose'', National Public Radio, as well as the front page of ''The New York Times'' and ''The Wall Street Journal''. Biography McDuffie was born into a musical family in Macon, Georgia, United States. Both his mother, Susan McDuffie, and his younger sister, Margerie McDuffie, are pianists. He attend ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Four Seasons (Vivaldi)
''The Four Seasons'' ( it, Le quattro stagioni) is a group of four violin concertos by Italian composer Antonio Vivaldi, each of which gives musical expression to a season of the year. These were composed around 1718−1720, when Vivaldi was the court chapel master in Mantua. They were published in 1725 in Amsterdam, together with eight additional concerti, as (''The Contest Between Harmony and Invention''). ''The Four Seasons'' is the best known of Vivaldi's works. Though three of the concerti are wholly original, the first, "Spring", borrows patterns from a sinfonia in the first act of Vivaldi's contemporaneous opera ''Il Giustino''. The inspiration for the concertos is not the countryside around Mantua, as initially supposed, where Vivaldi was living at the time, since according to Karl Heller they could have been written as early as 1716–1717, while Vivaldi was engaged with the court of Mantua only in 1718. They were a revolution in musical conception: in them Vivaldi repr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vivaldi
Antonio Lucio Vivaldi (4 March 1678 – 28 July 1741) was an Italian composer, virtuoso violinist and impresario of Baroque music. Regarded as one of the greatest Baroque composers, Vivaldi's influence during his lifetime was widespread across Europe, giving origin to many imitators and admirers. He pioneered many developments in orchestration, violin technique and programatic music. He consolidated the emerging concerto form into a widely accepted and followed idiom, which was paramount in the development of Johann Sebastian Bach's instrumental music. Vivaldi composed many instrumental concertos, for the violin and a variety of other musical instruments, as well as sacred choral works and more than fifty operas. His best-known work is a series of violin concertos known as '' the Four Seasons''. Many of his compositions were written for the all-female music ensemble of the '' Ospedale della Pietà'', a home for abandoned children. Vivaldi had worked as a Catholic pries ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
