Georg Friedrich Haas: Second Violin Concerto for Violin and Orchestra (2016)
Georg Friedrich Haas
born 16 Aug. 1953 in Graz (A)
World premiere:
7 Sept. 2017 by Miranda Cuckson in Tokyo (Japan)
Recording:
2022 Miranda Cuckson, available on Youtube
The internationally renowned contemporary Austrian composer Georg Friedrich Haas (*1953) composed his Second Violin Concerto for the Australian violinist Miranda Cuckson, who lives in New York and premiered it in Tokyo in 2017. It is interesting how Miranda Cuckson responds to the request to describe this violin concerto to someone who does not yet know it. With every contemporary work of music, you are faced with the fact that there is no performance tradition and no interpretative approach that pre-structures the listening experience. It is an opportunity to go on a search with the first interpreter of this work in order to delve deeper into it:
Haas’ new concerto is a work of over 30 minutes for violin and full orchestra. In atmosphere it’s quite dark and turbulent. The music seems to yearn for a calm, gentle mood but is disrupted by threats of violence, and the interaction between solo and orchestra conveys the shifting dynamic of disturbing forces. The piece is somewhat in the vein of the Romantic concertos, but also ventures into experimental territory with its unusual form, harmonies and use of the orchestra.
The violin sometimes plays sweeping gestures that ride on top of the texture, ranging from low outbursts to the violin’s extreme high register. It has some exposed, poignant melodies, as well as fast passages of arpeggios and scales. Though essentially idiomatic, these sometimes involve microtones, creating modes less familiar than the scales and arpeggios Western classical musicians grow up practicing! The degree of microtonality is unusual in a concerto, and it’s a tuning and ensemble challenge. Haas sometimes has the strings playing divisi, one player per part.
The concerto’s nine continuous sections are Praeludium (1), Kadenz (2), Resonanz und Feedback (3), Dreistimmige Invention (4), Sgraffito (5), Sotto voce (6), Interludium (7), just intonation (8) and Aria (9).
As in his first violin concerto (1998), harmonic structures formed from overtone series collide with tritone or fourth/fifth chords that lead into almost endless sound loops.
Quotes from the composer about his view of music can also make it easier to get to grips with this work:
"I realised two things early on: the twelve notes that a piano has per octave are not enough for me. I need narrower intervals, finer gradations. And I want to compose expressive, emotional
music that touches and moves"
"Anyone who composes seriously pushes the boundaries of what is possible, regardless of whether their name is Bruckner or Lachenmann or Cerha or Ligeti."
"I hope that you can't learn anything from my music, because it's not my intention to come along with a raised index finger and say: 'Watch out, ladies and gentlemen, these are overtone series! '
That's not the idea, I want to reach people, touch people, broaden their sensibilities and - what art can do - awaken them."
"The loss of religion is a painful gap. For me, music in particular and art in general have stepped into this painful gap. (...) Today we live in a time in which people's need for spirituality is
seemingly satisfied by completely false and dangerous sides. Art is the only area I know where spirituality and rationality can merge 100 per cent and without contradiction, (...) and that is
what I strive for as a composer in my music."
G.F. Haas already described his understanding of a solo concerto for the first violin concerto as follows:
"I do not understand the solo concerto in the sense of the Romantic virtuoso concerto, in which the soloist can shine and show himself as a brilliant individual, as the leader of a
collective. For me, the form of the concerto offers the opportunity to show how a single figure behaves in relation to a collective. So I don't present a radiant soloist who dominates the
ensemble, but a figure who achieves resonance. And there are also moments in which the soloist is literally trampled on by the ensemble until there is nothing left of him."
Listen here!
A listening companion for more concentrated listening:
I. Praeludium (00'00)
Right at the beginning, the solo violin starts shrilly with a long double-stop in D/G, and is intercepted by softly glistening fifths of multiply divided string instruments, reminiscent of an
orchestra tuning up.
Another long violin double-stop enters, this time harmonically in E/GIS, again followed by the repeated resonance of the string sound.
Softly accompanied by muted trombones, the violin plays its soft double-stop A/FIS pianissimo in a lighter colour.
The gentle fade-out is replaced by a new warm tone colour in the woodwinds, also on a long note, first in the clarinets, then also on A/FIS in the flutes. The flutes brighten. In the brightest
light, the sound suddenly breaks off, only an accordion in the highest register is barely audible, everything falters until the violin begins again forte in C/CIS. Slowly and steadily, the
resonance in the orchestra increases, a dark tuba sound joins in, the sound swells until, with a run-up in the orchestra, there is a violent fortissimo outburst that creates the necessary space
for the cadenza of the violin.
II. Kadenz (03'20)
With a cry of despair, the solo violin throws itself into its cadenza. It finds its emotionally agitated expression in the highest, icy tones. It is interrupted twice by heavy blows from the
orchestra. The violin plunges into increasingly hasty downward figures.
Then it begins again with slow, calm strokes in a chorale-like manner, almost romantically singing its melody to itself. Once again, the orchestra strikes hard in between several times and drives
the violin forward emotionally so that it cannot find peace.
The cadenza wanders along over restless tremolos, up and down and restlessly rushing forward. Further violent orchestral beats almost freeze the violin in the highest icy tones. Only slowly does
this frosty violin exaltation calm down and finds some reassurance and freedom from this desperately divided and driven state in repeated pizzicato approaches and gettato bowings.
III. Resonanz und Feedback (09'00)
A low, soft melody beginning on the G string (ascending starting with A flat C) brings some peace to the proceedings. The orchestra responds with a warm resonant space that expands
underneath.
The violin lays itself over this sound texture with an extremely high tone, only to plunge back into the calmer pitch of the chorale-like melody. In a constant change of sound, accompanied and
threatened by the orchestra's resonances, the violin continues to follow the chorale's trail (Is it an echo of Bach's chorale "Es ist genug", which Alban Berg incorporated into his violin
concerto in twelve-tone music?).
Only now does the sound world of the chorale-like melody from the beginning of this section begin again. Low cellos take over the melodic line, at first still pleasantly spiritual. The soundscape
moves faster and faster and the solo violin drives the music forward with its accelerando, halting and repetitive, moving up and down. Dark double stops replace these upward and downward
movements, leaving dark resonance and high accordion chirps at the end.
IV. Dreistimmige Intervention (14'45)
From the remaining cloud of sound, the violin descends from above into a world where dissonant polyphony briefly prevails: two solo violin parts play challenging, cutting polyphony together with the orchestra's violin choir. In terms of compositional technique, each line of counterpoint is a strand of microtonal clusters.
V. Sgraffito (16'40)
New clusters of sound build up over trombone, wind and harp sounds. Harp glissandi and then interjections from the percussion structure the sound spaces until the violin, with its muted up and
down movements, first reenters inaudibly beneath the orchestral layers and slowly emerges, accompanied by tremolo and crescendoing and decrescendoing orchestral colours.
(The term sgraffito is derived from the Italian verb sgraffiare or graffiare, meaning to scratch. In architecture, it is a decorative technique for the treatment of wall surfaces.
Wikipedia).
VI. Sotto Voce (18'00)
While the violin continues its movements undisturbed, the sound of the orchestra recedes into the background. Unusual whistle and cluster tones as well as key noises from the woodwinds become
audible in the background. Temple block rhythms are mixed in.
A melodious series of notes in the violin, wandering up and down, first in the lower range, then again in high tones, passes over the noises and sounds and continuously accelerates. The
melodiousness transforms into dark glissando loops. A violin note remains extremely high.
VII. Interludium (20'35)
Barely noticeable, the resonance chamber of the orchestra transforms into an allegretto. A fine, extremely high note from the violin floats above it until a glissando melody loop emerges twice in
the violin. Gong chimes in the orchestra sound in between.
Two more melody loops in the violin. Timpani in the background. The orchestra's cloud of sound condenses and unifies ...
VIII. just intonation (23'50)
... and concentrates more and more on the note of G raised by a quarter tone. This long G note is sustained in unison. The solo violin plays the notes of its tone row high above it. These
intonation units are spun out and sustained for several seconds.
Then the unison tone begins to radiate from within, the harmony expands, harp sounds fill the sound. Vibraphone, marimba and brass instruments down to the bass tuba join in and further enrich the
sonority.
The string instruments sustain a precise overtone chord for several counted seconds, while the violin plays its melodious microtonal tone series.
A strong ff trombone note fills the room. Its fading is followed by an equally strong ff trumpet blast, which fades away just as slowly.
Finally, the violin sings a sweet, hopeful melody in correctly tuned thirds double stops. Harmonically new and fresh sound harmonies follow as a resonance.
The violin ascends alone in sevenths and leads on to the final aria, which is introduced by a warm orchestral sound.
IX. Aria (28'50)
The orchestra and timpani rhythms in the discreet background accompany the violin, which expands its polyphonic melody. A pulsation in the orchestral sound becomes increasingly menacing in the foreground. The violin, driven up to extreme heights, becomes more and more distressed with its melody and throws itself again and again into its fleeting and rushing up and down movements, but is rushed on and on until it sinks wearily and simply breaks off in the middle of the action.... and leaves the listener alone in everything beautiful and threatening.