Concerto in E flat for alto saxophone and strings Op.109

Allegro moderato – Andante – Allegro

Glazunov’s Saxophone Concerto was one of the first works of its kind by any major composer. The only other contender, among those that are still performed today, is Ibert’s Concertino da camera which, as the title suggests, is on rather smaller scale. The two works were written at much the same time, in 1934, and they were both commissioned by Sigurd Rascher, the German saxophonist who did much to establish a basic repertoire for the instrument. Apart from a starring role for alto saxophone, however, they have little in common. Ibert’s Concertino is a trendy and very Parisian score that acknowledges the saxophone’s role in the popular music of the time; Glazunov’s Concerto, though it too was written in Paris, is a rather more conventional inspiration. Old enough to have studied with Rimsky-Korsakov and to have been of help to Shostakovich in his student days, Glazunov in self-imposed exile in France in his late 60s was clearly not a composer to follow the latest musical fashions.

Even so, while the Saxophone Concerto in E flat is not essentially different from the famous Violin Concerto in A minor written more than 30 years earlier, it does reflect something of the neo-classical spirit of the day. Glazunov’s gift for romantic melody, though not neglected here, is less in evidence than the contrapuntal enterprise he displays in writing for his often much-divided string ensemble. At the same time the construction, which resembles that of the Violin Concerto in that it contains several distinct sections in one movement, is much more tightly organised. The theme that holds the whole thing together is the one emphatically introduced by the strings, in a rare passage of unison, in the opening bars. The saxophone prefers a more decorative variant and, while the strings offer occasional reminders of the original version of the main theme, the solo instrument is free to wander off in its own flights of fantasy, most strikingly in a lively and brilliantly scored scherzo episode.

After a loud pizzicato chord and a short pause, the strings recall the main theme in the initial tempo and gradually transform it into the expressive melody with which the saxophone opens the central Adagio section. Imaginatively developed, with numerous felicitous examples of string counterpoint and several tempo changes, the Andante leads, by way of the saxophone’s first pronouncement of the main theme in its original form, to an extensive and challenging cadenza. Another transition, in which the soloist plays a prominent part, pieces together the theme of the closing Allegro – a gigue-like idea introduced by the saxophone alone and then taken up in fugato form by violins followed by cellos and basses. As the counterpoint continues in ingenious detail, the soloist recalls themes from earlier movements in broader lines above it. Once the long-term unity of the work is secured in this way, the saxophone is once more free to indulge its fantasy, which it does with increasing brilliance as it approaches the closing bars.