Concerto for Violin and Orchestra, Op.14

SAMUEL BARBER earned a reputation as the most conservative American composer of the mid-twentieth century. He clearly did not succumb to the general artistic trends of the time, while, for example, Aaron Copland carried on the folk wave (from Bartók and Stravinsky) and Charles Ives embraced abstract expression and dodecaphonic technique. Against the backdrop of the first musical avant-garde and its new expression, Barber continued his style's epistles of high craftsmanship, taste, natural, pleasing and expressive melodies and rich orchestration. Elegiac lyricism in his music is an intrinsic trait and has been evident since the age of 7 when he composed his first opus, Sadness. It also dominates his Violin Concerto to some extent. There is a documented history around the process of creating the concerto, thanks to two biographers of the composer. From interviews, letters and archival documents published in late 2010, it becomes clear that in 1939 the wealthy businessman Samuel Simeon Fels commissioned Barber to compose a Violin Concerto for his ward Iso Briselli, who had graduated with a violin degree in 1934 from the Curtis Institute of Music. Barber accepted Fels's down payment and in the summer of 1939 went to Switzerland to work on the concerto. He had planned to finish it before the October 1 deadline, but World War II took him by surprise. In August he left for Paris and thence to the United States. He continued his work in the USA. The first two movements disappointed Briselli for being "too easy", but he approved of them as music. The dialogue about the merits of the concerto continued through letters. Albert Meiff, Briselli 's teacher, stated to the composer that the violin part was far from the specifics of the instrument, that it should be "surgically operated on" because "the technical embellishments are very far from the requirements of the modern violinist". After hard work on the third movement, and after a preliminary rehearsal, Barber declared that it was 'fit for performance' and that he "could not destroy the part in which he had complete confidence." In addition, Albert Meiff gave a full analysis of the violin part in a letter to the composer: the work "lacks sufficient backbone - it is not powerful, it is not majestic - it does not contain enough dramatic moments to potentially contribute to a successful performance". His final conclusion was that it contained 'the wrong idea and Mr Barber should admit it'. After a 1940 performance with the Curtis Institute Orchestra under Fritz Rainer, the official premiere was given in 1941 with the Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by Eugene Ormandy and featuring violinist Albert Spalding. A Carnegie Hall repeat followed, and since then the concert has become one of the most popular repertoires of the twentieth century. All three movements reflect Barber's identification with the major symphonists - Brahms, R. Strauss, Rachmaninoff, Prokofiev and Shostakovich.