Monday, January 26, 2009

Violin Concertos

Assuming that the world has produced at least 7000 composers since the craft was first taken seriously by someone (we do not know who.) Then further assuming that at least ten percent of these men and women produced at least one violin concerto, that would give us 700 violin concertos from which to choose. When considering that the bulk of the concertos being performed today were written by no more than twenty composers - Bach, Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, Paganini, Mendelssohn, Spohr, Wieniawski, Brahms, Bruch, Vieuxtemps, Sibelius, Tchaikovsky, Saint Saenz, Prokofiev, Stravinsky, Shostakovitch, Korngold, Barber - that leaves the rest (680) of these 700 composers out altogether. We hear the same concertos over and over and over and over and over and over and over again...especially when it comes to the Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Bruch, Sibelius, and Tchaikovsky concertos. Why?

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