Concerto

A concerto (from the Italian: concerto, plural concerti or, often, the anglicised form concertos) is a musical composition, whose characteristics have changed over time. In the 17th century, "sacred works for voices and orchestra were typically called concertos." J. S. Bach "was thus reflecting a long-standing tradition when he used the title `concerto' for many of the works that we know as cantatas.". But in recent centuries, up to the present, a concerto is a piece usually composed in three parts or movements, in which (usually) one solo instrument (for instance, a piano, violin, cello or flute) is accompanied by an orchestra or concert band.

The etymology is uncertain, but the word seems to have originated from the conjunction of the two Latin words conserere (meaning to tie, to join, to weave) and certamen (competition, fight): the idea is that the two parts in a concerto, the soloist and the orchestra or concert band, alternate episodes of opposition, cooperation, and independence in the creation of the music flow.

Piano concerto

A piano concerto is a concerto written for a piano accompanied by an orchestra or other large ensemble.

Keyboard concerti were common in the time of Johann Sebastian Bach. Occasionally, Bach's harpsichord concerti are played on piano.

History

In the 17th and 18th centuries, typical concertos for keyboard were organ concertos and harpsichord concertos, such as those written by George Friedrich Handel and Johann Sebastian Bach.

Classical and romantic

As the piano developed and became accepted, composers naturally started writing concerti for it. This happened in the late 18th century, during the Classical music era. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was the most important composer in the early development of the form. Mozart's body of masterly piano concerti put his stamp firmly on the genre well into the Romantic era.

Mozart wrote many piano concertos for himself to perform (his 27 piano concertos also include concerti for two and three pianos). With the rise of the piano virtuoso, many composer-pianists did likewise, notably Ludwig van Beethoven, Frédéric Chopin, and Robert Schumann—and also lesser-known musicians like Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Joseph Wölfl, Carl Maria von Weber, John Field, Ferdinand Ries, and F. X. Mozart.

Violin concerto

A violin concerto is a concerto for solo violin (occasionally, two or more violins) and instrumental ensemble, customarily orchestra. Such works have been written since the Baroque period, when the solo concerto form was first developed, up through the present day. Many major composers have contributed to the violin concerto repertoire, with the best known works including those by Bach, Bartók, Beethoven, Brahms, Bruch, Mendelssohn, Mozart, Paganini, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Sibelius, Tchaikovsky, and Vivaldi. Traditionally a three-movement work, the violin concerto has been structured in four movements by a number of modern composers, including Dmitri Shostakovich, Igor Stravinsky, and Alban Berg (in the latter, the first two and last two movements are connected, with the only break coming between the second and third). In some violin concertos, especially from the Baroque and modern eras, the violin (or group of violins) is accompanied by a chamber ensemble rather than an orchestra—for instance, Vivaldi's L'estro armonico, originally scored for four violins, two violas, cello, and continuo, and Allan Pettersson's first concerto, for violin and string quartet.

Daniel Barenboim

Daniel Barenboim (German: [baːrənboim], Hebrew: דניאל ברנבוים; born 15 November 1942) is an Argentine-Israeli pianist and conductor, who also is a citizen of Palestine and Spain. He is general music director of the Berlin State Opera, and the Staatskapelle Berlin; he previously served as Music Director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre de Paris and La Scala in Milan. Barenboim is known for his work with the West–Eastern Divan Orchestra, a Seville-based orchestra of young Arab and Israeli musicians, and as a resolute critic of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories.

Barenboim has received many awards and prizes, including an honorary Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire, France's Légion d'honneur both as a Commander and Grand Officier, and the German Großes Bundesverdienstkreuz and Willy Brandt Award. Together with the Palestinian-American scholar Edward Said, he was given Spain's Prince of Asturias Concord Award. He has won seven Grammy awards for his work and discography. Barenboim is a polyglot, fluent in Spanish, Hebrew, English, French, Italian, and German.

Piano Concerto No. 21 (Mozart)

The Piano Concerto No. 21 in C major, K. 467, was completed on March 9, 1785 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, four weeks after the completion of the previous D minor concerto, K. 466.

Structure

The concerto has three movements:

The opening movement begins quietly with a march figure, but quickly moves to a more lyrical melody interspersed with a fanfare in the winds. The music grows abruptly in volume, with the violins taking up the principal melody over the march theme, which is now played by the brass. This uplifting theme transitions to a brief, quieter interlude distinguished by a sighing motif in the brass. The march returns, eventually transitioning to the entrance of the soloist. The soloist plays a brief Eingang (a type of abbreviated Cadenza) before resolving to a trill on the dominant G while the strings play the march in C major. The piano then introduces new material in C major and begins transitioning to the dominant key of G major. Immediately after an orchestral cadence finally announces the arrival of the dominant, the music abruptly shifts to G minor in a passage that is reminiscent of the main theme of the Symphony No. 40 in that key. A series of rising and falling chromatic scales then transition the music to the true second theme of the piece, an ebullient G major theme which Mozart had previously used in his Third Horn Concerto. The usual development and recapitulation follow. There is a cadenza at the end of the movement, although Mozart's original has been lost.