Classical Music | Violin Music

Recorded on 07/08/2009, uploaded on 08/31/2009

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

As the battered European continent struggled through the immediate aftermath of World War I, Maurice Ravel faced his own personal struggles. In 1917, his mother passed away, ending his dearest and closest relationship throughout his life, as well as adding grief to his already weakened state of health. In the realm of music, Claude Debussy (who Ravel greatly admired while also vehemently denying that he imitated the elder composer’s work) died in 1918, suddenly leaving Ravel as the foremost composer of French music. Yet, at the same time, a new style of music was emerging, exemplified in the works of Satie, Stravinsky and Schoenberg. Ravel quickly bolstered his creative energies and made his own contributions to the new decade, embracing the burgeoning Jazz Age and the new emphasis on economy of means, a concept pioneered by Debussy himself.

Nowhere in Ravel’s music is this latter concept seen than in the Sonata for Violin and Cello composed in 1927 and dedicated to the memory of Debussy. In its four movements, Ravel strips down the music, harmonically speaking, to its near bare essentials. It reflects the composer’s growing interest in counterpoint and, consequently, an increasing tendency to subject harmony to melody. The Sonata, no doubt, was a challenge to compose and Ravel likely learned to the fullest extent the truth of J. S. Bach’s statement that two-part harmony is the most difficult to write effectively. Yet, Ravel indeed surmounted the challenge, creating a thoughtful work and one that begs closer inspection by the inquisitive mind. Like Ravel’s other chamber works, the Sonata for Violin and Cello adheres to a Classically-inspired structure with faster-paced outer movements framing a scherzo and slow movement.      Joseph DuBose

Courtesy of International Music Foundation.