SKU: HL.14008406

ISBN 9780711948716.

A work for solo violin and orchestra, commissioned by Donald McDonald for the 21st birthday of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and the 60th birthday of the composer. It was first performed in November 1993 in Glasgow, by James Clark and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra conducted by Maxwell Davies. The spell is one quoted by George Mackay Brown in his book An Orkney Tapestry: 'Let not plough be put to acre except a fiddle cross first the furrow.' Davies's dancing concerto imagines the fiddler following a route from field to field, from dance to dance, accompanied by a bunch of companions in the form of an orchestra. As the music goes on, so it gets brighter and livelier, moving from the dark colouring of clarinets, bassoons and strings to full ensemble with prominent brass and (solo) tuned percussion, as if the dancers as much as the fields were beginning to glow with new life. Score (miniature). Duration c. 20mins.

SKU: HL.49019901

ISBN 9790001196611. 9.25x12.0x0.186 inches.

Enjott Schneider's Concerto for violoncello takes up the Sumerian legend of the bird deity 'Dugud' in archaic scenes. Legend has it that Princess Emeshe was impregnated by the hermaphrodite - half eagle, half falcon - in a dream and founded with her son Almos, who had thus been conceived, the royal Hungarian dynasty.In expressive musical pictures, Schneider describes the dark-erotic struggle of impregnation as well as the chant of the unborn. Hovering above everything is the vision of life in complete freedom like a bird.The work was premiered by the Hungarian cellist Laszlo Fenyo in 2011. Thanks to the piano score written by the composer, the work can now also be studied and performed by a duo.

SKU: BR.PB-16110

ISBN 9790004214374. 10 x 12.5 inches.

Johannes Brahms's only violin concerto, one of the most important violin concertos of the 19th century, is now a central repertoire piece. This fact is all the more notable, as, by his own account, Brahms understood all too little about the instrument. The concerto was composed at Worthersee during the summer of 1878 in collaboration with Joseph Joachim, a leading contemporary violinist. The solo part is extremely demanding, with really unusual difficulties. This circumstance did not go unnoticed by the critics of the first performance: Even to Joachim, the battled-seasoned wrestler, the technically difficult and tricky solo part was to be mastered only with obvious effort. Evidencing this close collaboration between composer and performer is not only the work's genesis and publication history, together with its dedication to Joachim, but also its solo cadenza. Based on the New Brahms Complete Edition, this Urtext edition includes both the printed version of Joachim's cadenza as well as its shorter version arranged in 1885 by the violinist Marie Soldat.