Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto on Bayan

Advanced violin players are familiar with this outstanding work by Pyotr Ilyich. The famous Violin Concerto in D Major is known worldwide as one of the most difficult works for violin. The 3-part piece requires huge technical skill and immense concentration to be performed flawlessly (especially taking into consideration that there’s no pause between the last two movements).

Pyotr Tchaikovski and Iosif Kotek 

Written in 1878 on the shore of Lake Geneva, the concerto became composer’s way of the big depression he suffered after the devastating marriage. The young violinist Iosif Kotek (who presumably was composer’s lover) served as the major catalyst for the composition’s creation. However, to avoid the gossips, Tchaikovsky did not officially dedicate the work to his pupil.

Besides the violin, the original instrumentation of the piece includes flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns, trumpets, timpani and strings. The last thing you’d probably expect this piece to be heard on is bayan. But just listen how brilliantly the third movement sounds performed on it! The young man Alexandr Chrustevich does some little magic on his instrument, so fast and yet so flawless.

Maurice Ravel's "Jeux d'Eau" for Piano

Maurice Ravel composed this piece in 1901 and admitted that it was the beginning of a certain novelty that appeared in his music style.

Literally, “Jeux d’eau” is translated from French as ‘water games’, but you can come across other translations of the piece’s title such as ‘playing water’ or even ‘fountains’. The original manuscript contains an inscription made by Ravel that says ‘river god laughing as the water tickles him…’ This is a quote from a poem by Henri de Régnier – “Cité des eaux”.

In fact, the creation of this solo piano piece had a couple of powerful influences. First of all, at the time of composition, Ravel was a student of Gabriel Fauré and it is Fauré to whom “Jeux d’eau” was dedicated. Another strong inspiration was Franz Liszt. Particularly, his piece “The Fountains of the Villa d'Este” from the 1883 “Third Year” suite. The playful melodic sound of the water cascades made many composers think of expressing this natural phenomenon in their music, in fact.

The first pianist to perform “Jeux d’eau” publicly in 1902 was Ricardo Viñes who often premiered piano works by notable composers like Debussy, Falla, Satie. I personally love the 1977’s performance of this beautiful piano work by Martha Argerich: