My appreciation of Weinberg grows almost daily, but it's frustrating trying to find recordings of some pieces, including this one. That's unfortunate and I hope it changes. Thanks, Sr. Borges, for posting this piece.
This music goes right into my hart,… beautiful performance this cello player. Weinberg is a master composer in my opinion,…. Pleas listen also to his cello concerto.
An incredibly accessible piece that should have made his name as Bloch's violin concerto made his. Perhaps it shall still come to pass, the century is young, and this is so evocative of a 20th century that seems to have failed us in so many ways.
Simply powerful. The difference btw him and Sostakovic ? He was totally Jewish. Dmitri wasn't. Both they had the capacity to use every instrument at best and the orchestration is always perfect. Of course Weinberg was a Sostakovic's pupil and he admitted the strong influence the big Master had on his music, but he was able to write his own music at best, and he became one of the greatest musician of his age...The fact he is unknown is a problem of the massified and wrong world... He lived a tragic life, like many other people who had the destiny to born in that part of the world in that dark age. But it is also the reason why his music is so beautiful...
franco savadori Convém reconhecer, no entanto, que a linguagem mais pessoal e acessível de Weinberg não se manteve até o fim. Sua última fase é repleta de obras emocionalmente desoladas, e parecem explorar de forma unilateral e exagerada um dos aspectos do estilo de Shostakovitch. Mas o que em Shostakovich é ambíguo ou irônico, em Weinberg é simplesmente terrível e desolado. Compare essa phantasia com, por exemplo, as sinfonias da completa maturidade do compositor. Google Translate: It should recognize, however, that the more personal and accessible language Weinberg was not maintained to the end. His last stage is filled with emotionally desolate works, and seem to exploit unilateral and exaggerated form one aspect of Shostakovitch style. But what in Shostakovich is ambiguous or ironic, in Weinberg is just terrible and desolate. Compare this phantasy with, for example, the symphonies of full maturity of the composer. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-fyEuCR1w6RU.html ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-7xmoC53rvuU.html
It's so nice and true what you said. My only point is I am not sure Weinberg was a pupil of Shostakovich. Rather, they were just friends, with the latter a bit older than the former. Also, as far as I know, the influence was mutual. They say Shostakovich got interested in Jewish music through Weinberg, thanks to the friendship.
He wasn't a pupil of Shostakovich. He had already developed a well-defined style by the time he met Shostakovich in Tashkent, which is where they had both been evacuated to during the war. Of course, he was influenced by the older composer, but it can't be said that he "studied under" him in any kind of formal or informal setting.
James Levee You are right, here is some biographical information on Mieczysław Weinberg - culture.pl/en/artist/mieczyslaw-weinberg Greetings from Warsaw
"He lived a tragic life". Nonsense. Weinberg was an accomplished composer in a country that took care of its musical elite. He was free to write the music he wanted, his music was performed and published. He died at the age of 77 - a well known and respected Soviet/Russian composer.
A beautiful work indeed, but it only hints at the depth of meaning that Weinberg accomplished in his later efforts, which proved him to be one of the greatest Russian composers (a fact which I discovered just recently via YT). That's not to belittle this music, which is a model of the conservative style that the composer meant to produce.
Another comment. I recently heard his Concerto op. 43 and the contrast with this fantasy is quite typical and logic. The concerto follow more or less the "rules" of the genre as set up by XIX th Century tradition (with obviously an expressions of Weinberg's own) while the Fantasia is more free, while not being Rhapsodic at ll. It is firmly constructed, but along with personal rules. The two works appera to ma as one of Weinberg's masterworks. I am quite curious about his chamber music, which is difficult to hear or to get as scores.
***** Era uma estátua de Hitler ajoelhado em posição de oração, colocada em Varsóvia. Aqui é vista por trás. Google translate: It was a statue of Hitler kneeling in prayer position, placed in Warsaw. Here it is seen from behind.
+PietjePuk Parece que, felizmente, se eu não esclarecer do que se trata, ninguém saberá. Google translate: It seems that finally, if I do not clarify what it is, no one knows.
Conservatism in this case is not exclusively a matter of personal choice: Weinberg was an expatriate Polish Jew in Soviet Russia, and this work was written during the final years of Stalinism, between 1951 and 1953.
If I am not mistaken, Weinberg was arrested during the definitive pogrom Stalin planned for Russia, in the farce known as "The Conspiracy of Physicians." The death of the dictator interrupted what was to be his last sinister feat.
Weinberg's father-in-law was murdered on orders by Stalin in 1948, that was also the year of the notorious Zhdanov decrees and doctrine which culminated in a special congress by the Composer's Union, April 1948 in which Dmitri Shostakovich, Sergei Prokofiev, Aram Khachaturian and many others were attacked and prosecuted for allegedly writing "hermetic" music and misusing dissonance. They had to repent publicly and were humiliated. Wainberg's music escaped thanks to his 'conservatism'. But in 1953 he got arrested but lucky for him Stalin died a month later (and Beria) which saved him and got him officially rehabilitated.
I read that Weinberg's arrest in 1953 (year of Stalin's death and relief for his victims) was due to the fact that he was Jewish and happened at the same time as the arrest of many Jews who were about to suffer a definitive and total pogrom , triggered by a conspiracy fraud known as "The Case of Physicians." It was Stalin's death that interrupted this ominous tribute to his posthumous glory.
