10. Main Evening Concert

Shostakovich pays homage to Bach

The adventurous Ukrainian violinist, Diana Tishchenko, joins with the brilliant Argentinian chamber musician José Gallardo for two powerful violin sonatas. Boris Lyatoshynsky was a Ukrainian composer, whose Violin Sonata dates from the Nineteen Twenties. It is a no-holds-barred piece in the style of the time, briefly a time of hope before the Soviet Empire crushed all hopes of Ukrainian independence. They follow this explosive opening with Enescu’s much-loved Third Sonata, one of the great violin sonatas of the 20th Century. Enescu evokes the styles of Romanian folk music, recreating and transfiguring it into a new and mysterious world. The wonderful meditative dialogue that opens the Sonata conjures a world that whispers and sings and even dances, while the Andante misterioso is an evocation in sound of the mystery of summer nights in Romania.

The story goes that Shostakovich’s Piano Quintet began as his second quartet, but the composer added the piano part so he could go on tour with the leading Russian quartets, Shostakovich of course being an outstanding pianist. To emphasize his point he begins with a declamatory solo Prelude intentionally recalling Bach, inevitably followed by a massive Fugue that encompassed all the sorrows of those terrible times. For those who have never experienced the music of Dmitri Shostakovich, this coruscating work is a brilliant introduction. It was composed in 1940, a short while before the Nazi invasion. Anna Fedorova will play Shostakovich’s part alongside the NOVO Quartet.