The Cello Concerto, Op. 27, is a concerto for cello and orchestra by
Graham Waterhouse
Graham Waterhouse (born 2 November 1962) is an English composer and cellist who specializes in chamber music. He has composed a cello concerto, '' Three Pieces for Solo Cello'' and '' Variations for Cello Solo'' for his own instrument, and str ...
, composed in 1990. It was first performed in 1995 in Toluca and Mexico City with the composer as the soloist, and published by
Friedrich Hofmeister Musikverlag
Friedrich Hofmeister Musikverlag (abbreviated to Hofmeister) is a publisher of classical music, founded by Friedrich Hofmeister in Leipzig in 1807. Early listings included composers Ludwig van Beethoven, Frédéric Chopin and Franz Liszt. Hofmei ...
in Leipzig in 2000.
History
The composer wrote a cello concerto in 1990 and played the solo part in the premiere in
Yverdon
Yverdon-les-Bains () (called Eburodunum and Ebredunum during the Roman era) is a municipality in the district of Jura-Nord vaudois of the canton of Vaud in Switzerland. It is the seat of the district. The population of Yverdon-les-Bains, , was ...
, Switzerland, in June that year. He revised the work considerably, mentored by
Siegfried Palm
Siegfried Palm (25 April 1927 – 6 June 2005) was a German cellist who is known worldwide for his interpretations of contemporary music. Many 20th-century composers like Kagel, Ligeti, Xenakis, Penderecki and Zimmermann wrote music for ...
. He first performed the revised version in Toluca and Mexico City
in June 1995 with the Orquesta Sinfónica del Estado de Mexico, conducted by Peter Robinson, along with Mozart's
Symphony No. 38 and Stravinsky's
Firebird Suite.
The concerto was published by
Friedrich Hofmeister Musikverlag
Friedrich Hofmeister Musikverlag (abbreviated to Hofmeister) is a publisher of classical music, founded by Friedrich Hofmeister in Leipzig in 1807. Early listings included composers Ludwig van Beethoven, Frédéric Chopin and Franz Liszt. Hofmei ...
in Leipzig in 2000.
Waterhouse played the concerto also in
Nizhny Novgorod
Nizhny Novgorod ( ; rus, links=no, Нижний Новгород, a=Ru-Nizhny Novgorod.ogg, p=ˈnʲiʐnʲɪj ˈnovɡərət ), colloquially shortened to Nizhny, from the 13th to the 17th century Novgorod of the Lower Land, formerly known as Gork ...
,
Weimar
Weimar is a city in the state of Thuringia, Germany. It is located in Central Germany between Erfurt in the west and Jena in the east, approximately southwest of Leipzig, north of Nuremberg and west of Dresden. Together with the neighbouri ...
and
Baden-Baden
Baden-Baden () is a spa town in the state of Baden-Württemberg, south-western Germany, at the north-western border of the Black Forest mountain range on the small river Oos, ten kilometres (six miles) east of the Rhine, the border with Fra ...
.
Hofmeister published a version for cello and piano,
which has been performed also with cello and organ.
A version for cello and chamber orchestra, Op. 27a, was first performed in
Idstein on 5 August 2005 by the Rumänische Nationalphilharmonie Oltenia, conducted by Angela Gehann-Dernbach.
Waterhouse was the soloist of the first performance in the UK on 9 February 2008 at The Dome in Cambridge, played by The Orchestra on the Hill, the combined orchestra of colleges including
Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 during the Second World War, and again from 1 ...
where the composer studied
Conductor Dominic Wyse also directed Bernstein's ''
Chichester Psalms
''Chichester Psalms'' is an extended choral composition in three movements by Leonard Bernstein for boy treble or countertenor, choir and orchestra. The text was arranged by the composer from the Book of Psalms in the original Hebrew. Part 1 us ...
'' in that concert.
He played the first performance in London, where he grew up, on 29 November 2015, with the North London Sinfonia.
Music
The concerto is structured in three movements, after the model of solo concertos of the classical period:
# Adagio – Allegro moderato
# Andante tranquillo
# Allegro con brio
The first movement has a slow introduction, with the soloist entering freely like in a cadenza over long chords of the winds. A dotted
motif is first played by cellos and basses, connects introduction and the Allegro in
sonata form
Sonata form (also ''sonata-allegro form'' or ''first movement form'') is a musical structure generally consisting of three main sections: an exposition, a development, and a recapitulation. It has been used widely since the middle of the 18th c ...
, is part of the main
theme
Theme or themes may refer to:
* Theme (arts), the unifying subject or idea of the type of visual work
* Theme (Byzantine district), an administrative district in the Byzantine Empire governed by a Strategos
* Theme (computing), a custom graphical ...
and dominates as an ostinato part of the
development
Development or developing may refer to:
Arts
*Development hell, when a project is stuck in development
*Filmmaking, development phase, including finance and budgeting
*Development (music), the process thematic material is reshaped
* Photograph ...
. The second movement is in
song form
Ternary form, sometimes called song form, is a three-part musical form consisting of an opening section (A), a following section (B) and then a repetition of the first section (A). It is usually schematized as A–B–A. Prominent examples inclu ...
. A motif of a downward
tritone
In music theory, the tritone is defined as a musical interval composed of three adjacent whole tones (six semitones). For instance, the interval from F up to the B above it (in short, F–B) is a tritone as it can be decomposed into the three adj ...
appears in a theme played first by the oboe, also in the first entrance of the cello which resembles improvisation, and in the cello's following cantilena. The movement is subdued and shaped by solo wind lines. The last movement plays with the
rondo form
The rondo is an instrumental musical form introduced in the Classical period.
Etymology
The English word ''rondo'' comes from the Italian form of the French ''rondeau'', which means "a little round".
Despite the common etymological root, rondo ...
. An energetic first theme contrasts to a lyrical episode.
According to the publisher, the composer shared the musical material between the soloist and the orchestra as equal partners, with
concertante
Sinfonia concertante (; also called ''symphonie concertante'') is an orchestral work, normally in several movements, in which one or more solo instruments contrast with the full orchestra.Collins: ''Encyclopedia of Music'', William Collins Sons & C ...
parts especially for the winds. The duration is given as 30 minutes.
References
External links
*
*
Nizhny Nowgorod 8/07/16Photos of a performance of Cello Concerto in Nizhny Nowgorod on 8 July 2016, with the composer as the cellist, the Academic Symphony Orchestra of Nizhnij Novgorod conducted by Alexander Skulsky
{{Authority control
Compositions by Graham Waterhouse
Cello concertos
Contemporary classical compositions
1990 compositions