Violin Concerto

Violin Concerto

Violin and chamber orchestra
(2.1.2bcl.1-1.1.1.0-2perc-hp-vn solo-3.2.2.2.1 or 6.4.4.4.2)
32 minutes
2013

The first movement is inspired by the paintings of Kazimir Malevich who froze dynamic motion into still images before cinema existed, envisioned humans as idealized conglomerations of metallic forms, and pioneered a proto-minimalist reductionism of form. The “shift” (sdvig), the sudden disruption or shearing of the visual surface that evokes dynamic motion, was an essential component of Malevich’s cubist-inspired paintings, including “The Knife Grinder / Principle of Flickering” from 1913.

The title of the second movement, Vèrelloe, is an invented word from the trans-rational sound poem “City Spring” by Konstantin Bolshakov, written in 1913. Trans-rational poetry is a product of thought moving faster than language and a vision of a future beyond words, here dwelling upon a fleeting moment: “Vizizàmi vizàmi the silence scurries / Kissing in the quieted vèrelloe of a trill, / Aksimèiu, oksàmi zizàm from sleep, / Aksemèiu oksàmi zasim izomelit.”

In the third and final movement, the orchestra is atomized and reassembled into churning choruses of machines as the soloist struggles for autonomy. Developing from Malevich’s atomization of painting, in 1922 Constructivist Alexei Gan unified aesthetics and Marxist political action into a triumvirate of disciplines: tektonika, konstruksiia and faktura. Inspired by geology, tektonika was the violent, volcanic reconstitution of elements into new forms. Constructivist architect Moisei Ginzburg clarified Gan’s vision into practice: the new technologies of the machine were the forms of the future.

“To feel the significance, the meaningfulness, of the sonorous ensemble of contemporary life, to be embraced by its joys and fears, its rhythm, its landscapes, its sky riddled with wires and hovering aeroplanes; to understand distance as it is broken down into fragments by the movement of the machine; the street cut about with sharp silhouettes, a bridge and the minute specks of the pedestrians scattered upon it—to feel all this and to formulate an adequate expression of it, is the task of our contemporary creativity.” — Moisei Ginzburg, 1924

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I first performed Christopher Adler’s violin solo Jolie Sphinx on the prestigious Ankunft: Neue Musik series at the Berlin Hauptbahnhof in the summer of 2011. It was the official CD release concert for Absconditus, Music of Sidney Corbett, and I needed additional solo works to complete the program. Fortuitously, I asked Sidney for recommendations and he mentioned Christopher Adler, who had been his student at Duke.

I connected with the piece immediately. It was challenging but there was a clear sense of expansion and contraction of thematic material, a place for my contribution as an interpreter and a clear and original compositional voice. Working on it that summer and preparing for the Berlin concerts had been immensely satisfying and it got me thinking.

I had been looking for a piece to pair with another violin concerto, Yael, written by Sidney Corbett, since premiering it in the U.S. earlier that summer. So, that fall I asked Christopher to write me a violin concerto. I was thrilled when he agreed. With grant support from Drake University, a year later we premiered the second movement, in a version for violin and piano, at the Firehouse Space in New York City. And on Feb 28th, 2014, we premiered a violin and piano version of the first movement at the University of San Diego.