Paganini: The Miracle on the violin
Essential works
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Miracle
violinist Niccolo Paganini |
Twenty Four Caprices, Op.1 (1820) Short unaccompanied studies, each
of which tackled a different violinistic problem. Musically very
attractive. No. 24 inspired and captivated Brahm’s Variations (for
piano) and the great Rhapsody on a theme of paganini which Rachmaninov
wrote for the piano and later danced as a ballet on the composer’s life
and choreographed by Lavrovsky.
Violin Concerto No. 1 in D. Op. 6 (1817-1818) The bouncing bow and
double-stop harmonics, feature in the popular last movement. It was a
short-lived score but revived later by Michael Rabin.
Violin Concerto No. 2 in B minor, Op. 7 (1826). The last movement,
nick-named La Clochette in which the soloist imitates a little bell.
Later, Liszt wrote a difficult piano version on this score. Le Streghe
(Witche’s Dance) Op.8 (1813) Among the most requested and played of
Paganini’s recital pieces.
Moto Perpetuo Op. 11 (1830) A non-stop perpetual in motion, whirlwind
of notes, to be exact, 2.248 notes, played at the rate of about thirteen
a minute. Full of gusto and bounce.
Fantasia on The G String: On a theme from Rossini’s Mosse in Citto,
literally played on just one string. Paganini use to send his audience
into rapture and hysteria as he walks on stage, turn around, snap-break
three strings and play on the single G String.
1. Paipiti, Op. 13 (Variations on D. From Rossini’s Tancredi (1819)
Triplets with double notes, double harmonic and left-hand pizzicati.
They are all here in this testing scores.
Softly, he would tread on to the stage, raise his violin and snap off
two strings, sending the audiences to sheer rapture with his playing.
Next day, he would create hysteria by snapping the third string and only
on the G string.
That was the iconic Paganini, the symbol of a whole epoch. Or going
further, Paganini begins where our reason stop. He had no power over his
genius as he rolled on like a great tornado. He was the most acclaimed
violinist in history. There shall never be one like him, not until the
end of the world.
Paganini was the Romantic virtuoso who was surrounded by legends
about his diabolical skills on the violin rebellious appearance and the
excesses of his life did nothing to dispel. Then came a turning point in
his brilliant career (though late) in 1934 when Sergei Rachmaninov
composed his celebrated Rhapshody on a theme of Paganini. It was the
composer who suggested to Mikhail Fokine to mount a narrative ballet
about Paganini using this score. So, in 1939, Fokine mouted his
production to Rachmaninior’s music for the Basil Ballet Russes, debuting
the first performance at Covent Garden in the summer just before the
break of the war.
In 1960 Paganini was staged in Moscow by the director of the Bolshoi
Ballet, Leonid Lavrovsky with Yaroslav Sekh as the tormented violinist.
However, Lavrovsky did not use the original Fokine’s visual scenario.
Instead, he evolved Paganini as tormented by an artistic and emotional
struggle of a great performer. He separated Paganini to seven sections:
First Improvisation
Enemies
A meeting
Loneliness and Despair
Love and Consolation
The Joy of Creative Work and Death
Finale:- Stronger than Death
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Life story of Paganini in ballet
choreographed by Lavrovsky for Bolshoi Ballet and titled
Paganini with Dmitri Guanor in the title role and Nina
Lagrinov as the Muse |
Rachminonov’s Rhapsody completely capture the imagination of
Lavrovsky because its central character was Paganini. Lavrovsky found
him to be passionate, rebellious and full of vitality. To this
choreographer who found the fervour of imagination in the violinist
struggling for his art and very much in love with himself was like
discovering a key to the zenith of classical ballet. He decided in his
ballet that the character of Paginini would not hold a real violin.
Lavrovsky made him the beautiful instrument that gave birth to music.
Paganini’s body was the symbol of the deathless beauty and power of
music. Thus, Paganini became the accessible, fascinating icon on the
violin and an illuminating source of insight that prevailed in every
heart.
Yet, one question keeps popping up all the time. Why is it that
Paganini is not as famous or popular as Mozart, Beethovan or
Tchaikovsky? Why is he not played in concert halls very often? May be
his brilliance is so vast, extraordinary with volumes of magnetism that
only the music-elite could read and play him.
What is extraordinary about Paganini is that in a concert career
spanning forty three years, he was forty five before he played outside
Italy and made his last public appearance only nine years after that.
The impact during this nine years was spectacular and unbelievable.
Though his father taught him the violin, he became a virtuoso on the
guitar and viola beside mastering the keyboard. He was only eight when
he made his first debut and at sixteen wrote the popular twenty four
caprices. At nineteen he left home to embark on his distinguished
musical career.
His love life was chequered like his music. He was in love with
Napoleon’s sister, the Princess Elise which broke down no sooner it
started. The most enduring relationship in Paganini’s life was with
singer.
Antonia Bianchi with whom he went on tours. They had a son named
Achille and although that relationship too broke down, Paganini was a
loving, devoted father and Achille accompanied his father on all tours
but never took up to music. When he died, Paganini had left behind a
whopping half million dollars to Achille.
His death had broken down and by 1834, there was a gradual decline in
his powers. In 1828 he had two operations on his jawbone and all his
teeth removed which robbed him of his speech and swallowing power.
In 1873 he suffered from laryngeal phthisis and breathed his last in
1840. The son he loved preciously. Achille passed away in 1895, lonely
and with a broken heart after his father’s death.
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