Sonata for solo violin (1944)

Tempo di ciaccona

Fuga: risoluto, non troppo vivo

Melodia: adagio - un poco più andante - tempo I

Presto - tranquillo - tempo I

When Yehudi Menuhin asked the ailing Bartók to write “just a work for violin alone” he was not expecting anything of the stature of what he later acknowledged as “the most important composition for violin alone since Bach.” But Bartók was never a composer to take the easy way out. Hearing Menuhin play Bach’s solo Sonata in C major, he was moved to write something on a similar scale and, in the first two of the four movements, with a scarcely less adventuous contrapuntal texture. At the same time, while modelling the overall structure of the work on the Sonata in C major, he he also addressed himself directly to the challenge represented by the great Ciaccona in the solo Partita in D minor.

Bartók’s Tempo di ciaccona first movement makes an allusion to Bach’s chaconne not only in the tempo heading but also in the multi-stopped chordal scoring of the opening bars, if not in the shape of the theme itself. Proceeding at first in the manner of a chaconne, with a regular turnover of material in contrasting colours every eight bars or so, it is subtly transformed into a sonata-form construction. The turning point is the entry of a clearly defined second subject, a lyrical melody articulated by gentle legato bowing of a kind so far excluded from the work. The increasingly impassioned development section is dominated by the opening theme which makes a dramatic (fortissimo) reappearance in something like its original form at the beginning of the recapitulation.

Like the equaivalent sections of Bach’s solo sonatas, Bartók’s second movement is a fugue. It is not just in three parts, however, but in four – which, bearing in mind that the modern violin can play no more than two notes at once, is an illusion that cannot be sustained for long. Even so, the composer contrives to give the violinist the opportunity to introduce answering voices by inserting rests between the short and emphatically pithy phrases of the fugue subject. Described by Menuhin as “aggressive, even brutal,” the Fuga is followed by the “complete serenity” of the Melodia – a Hungarian melodic inspiration of great beauty with an eerie night-music middle section and, recurring regularly in the outer sections and in the closing bars, a poetic echo effect in false harmonics.

The last movement is the equivalent of a Bach Presto but one that contradicts Bach in the sense that it re-introduces the quarter-tone intervals excluded from classical music ever since the establishment of the tempered scale. As the composer explained to Menuhin, however, they are merely colouristic and may be played as semitones. Whichever version is used, Bartók’s Presto is a brilliant rondo with a buzzing moto perpetuo main theme and two tuneful episodes – one a country dance, the other a slightly slower folk song.

Tempo di ciaccona

Fuga: risoluto, non troppo vivo

Melodia: adagio - un poco più andante - tempo I

Presto - tranquillo - tempo I

When Yehudi Menuhin asked the ailing Bartók to write “just a work for violin alone” he was not expecting anything of the stature of what he later acknowledged as “the most important composition for violin alone since Bach.” But Bartók was never a composer to take the easy way out. Hearing Menuhin play Bach’s solo Sonata in C major, he was moved to write something on a similar scale and, in the first two of the four movements, with a scarcely less adventuous contrapuntal texture. At the same time, while modelling the overall structure of the work on the Sonata in C major, he he also addressed himself directly to the challenge represented by the great Ciaccona in the solo Partita in D minor.

Bartók’s Tempo di ciaccona first movement makes an allusion to Bach’s chaconne not only in the tempo heading but also in the multi-stopped chordal scoring of the opening bars, if not in the shape of the theme itself. Proceeding at first in the manner of a chaconne, with a regular turnover of material in contrasting colours every eight bars or so, it is subtly transformed into a sonata-form construction. The turning point is the entry of a clearly defined second subject, a lyrical melody articulated by gentle legato bowing of a kind so far excluded from the work. The increasingly impassioned development section is dominated by the opening theme which makes a dramatic (fortissimo) reappearance in something like its original form at the beginning of the recapitulation.

Like the equaivalent sections of Bach’s solo sonatas, Bartók’s second movement is a fugue. It is not just in three parts, however, but in four – which, bearing in mind that the modern violin can play no more than two notes at once, is an illusion that cannot be sustained for long. Even so, the composer contrives to give the violinist the opportunity to introduce answering voices by inserting rests between the short and emphatically pithy phrases of the fugue subject. Described by Menuhin as “agressive, even brutal,” the Fuga is followed by the “complete serenity” of the Melodia - a Hungarian melodic inspiration of great beauty with an eerie night-music middle section and, recurring regularly in the outer sections and in the closing bars, a poetic echo effect in false harmonics.

The last movement is the equivalent of a Bach Presto but one that contradicts Bach in the sense that it re-introduces the quarter-tone intervals excluded from classical music ever since the establishment of the tempered scale. As the composer explained to Menuhin, however, they are merely colouristic and may be played as semitones. Whichever version is used, Bartók’s Presto is a brilliant rondo with a buzzing moto perpetuo main theme and two tuneful episodes – one a country dance, the other a slightly slower folk song.

Having given the composer technical advice in scoring the work, Menuhin gave the first performance – which was ”wonderful” according to Bartók – in New York in November 1944, ten months before the composer’s death in the same city.

Tempo di ciaccona

Fuga: risoluto, non troppo vivo

Melodia: adagio - un poco più andante - tempo I

Presto - tranquillo - tempo I

Of all the composers who have been bold enough to attempt to emulate J.S. Bach’s supreme achievement in writing extended works for unaccomapanied violin - Ysaÿe, Hindemith, Krenek, Honegger, Bartók… few have succeeded in creating anything interesting enough to hold a firm place in the repertoire. Indeed, the only post-Bach solo violin sonatas to appear in concert programmes with any kind of regularity are Ysaÿe’s and Bartók’s. “Bach’s genius intimidates anyone tempted do something in the same line,” said Ysaÿe, who nevertheless took the risk in a series of six beautifully written sonatas sketched over a period of just 24 hours in 1923. Bartók’s one solo Violin Sonata, which was more or less completed in March 1944, took rather longer. He understood the violin better than most composers but, unlike Ysaÿe, he was not himself a a violinist and was not at ease in this excessively difficult medium. He did, however, have the help and inspiration of Yehudi Menuhin, who was to give the first performance – “a wonderful performance,” according to Bartók – in New York in November 1944, ten months before the composer’s death in the same city.

When Menuhin commissioned “just a work for violin alone” he was not expecting anything of the stature of what he later acknowledged as “the most important composition for violin alone since Bach.” But Bartók was not a composer to take the easy way out and, hearing Menuhin play Bach’s solo Sonata in C major, he was moved to write something on a similar scale and, in the first two of the four movements, with a scarcely less adventuous contrapuntal texture. At the same time, while modelling the overall structure of the work on Bach’s Sonata in C major, he he also addressed himself directly to the challenge represented by the great Ciaccona in the solo Partita in D minor.

Bartók’s Tempo di ciaccona first movement makes an allusion to Bach’s chaconne not only in the tempo heading but also in the multi-stopped chordal scoring of the opening bars, if not in the shape of the theme itself. Proceeding at first in the manner of a chaconne, with a regular turnover of material in contrasting colours every eight bars or so, it is subtly transformed into a sonata-form construction. The turning point is the entry of a clearly defined second subject, a lyrical melody articulated by gentle legato bowing of a kind so far excluded from the work. The increasingly impassioned development section is dominated by the opening theme which makes a dramatic (fortissimo) reappearance in something like its original form at the beginning of the recapitulation. But nothing, as in all mature Bartók compositions, is repeated literally.

Like the equaivalent sections of Bach’s solo sonatas, Bartók’s second movement is a fugue. It is not just in three parts, however, but in four - which, bearing in mind that the modern violin can play no more than two notes at once, is an illusion that cannot be sustained for long. Even so, the composer contrives to give the violinist the opportunity to introduce answering voices by inserting rests between the short and emphatically pithy phrases of the fugue subject. Described by Menuhin as “agressive, even brutal,” the Fuga is followed by the “complete serenity” of the Melodia - a Hungarian melodic inspiration of great beauty with an eerie night-music middle section and, recurring regularly in the outer sections and in the closing bars, a poetic echo effect in false harmonics.

The last movement is the equivalent of a Bach Presto but one that contradicts Bach in the sense that it re-introduces the quarter-tone intervals excluded from classical music ever since the establishment of the tempered scale. As the composer explained to Menuhin, however, they are merely colouristic and may be played as semitones. Whichever version is used, Bartók’s Presto is a brilliant rondo with a buzzing moto perpetuo main theme and two tuneful episodes – one a country dance, the other a slightly slower folk song.