Dvorak: Cello Concerto, Waldesruhe, Rondo, Polonai

Ramon Jaffe, Staatsorchester Rheinische Philharmonie, Daniel Raiskin

The Cello Concerto op. 104 is one of Dvorák’s most famous cello concertos and numbers among his best known works, but what is not so well known is that already in 1865 he had composed a Cello Concerto in A major (without opus number). He wrote it for the cellist and composer Ludvig Peer, and when Peer died a few months after Dvorák, the manuscript was found among his papers and sold to the British Museum in London. The premiere of the work was held at the Prague Conservatory in 1929, during the commemorations on the twenty-fifth anniversary of Dvorák’s death, in a version with piano accompaniment prepared by Jan Burian. In this work, as in his first two symphonies, Dvorák in principle adhered to the classical and romantic traditions. But the concerto is extraordinarily complex in technique, and the virtuoso capabilities of the soloist are exploited in the most manifold ways – and here it is masterfully interpreted by Ramon Jaffé, a »cellist of world class« (Vladimir Ashkenazy). The young Dvorák is just as generous in melodic respects: at times his rich thematic imagination practically flows to overflowing.

Price: $25.98

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