Danse russe (1911/1932)

Before he got to know Samuel Dushkin, Stravinsky neither trusted virtuoso instrumentalists nor took any pleasure “in the blend of strings struck in the piano with strings set in vibration with the bow.” So it is an extraordinary tribute to the taste, tact, musical wisdom and technical accomplishment of the American-Jewish violinist - an Auer pupil the composer first met in Wiesbaden in 1931 - that he collaborated with him not only on the Violin Concerto but also on the Duo Concertant for violin and piano and a series of arrangements for the same two allegedly incompatible instruments - including the Suite Italienne from Pulcinella and the Divertimento from Le Baiser de la Fée.

While it is neither the most serious nor the most substantial of the violin-and-piano arrangements, the Danse russe is probably the most effective in terms of sonority. Stravinsky had already made a brilliant arrangement of the Danse russe for piano solo as one of the Three Movements from Petrushka in 1921. Now, eleven years later, as well the resources of the piano, he had at his disposal the violin’s caressing legato line, its fanciful harmonics, its percussive pizzicato and - the most characteristic feature of the Stravinsky-Dushkin sound - its multi-stopped muscularity, which so emphatically enhances both the vigorous start of the piece and its dramatic ending.