In the broadest sense, this is a concerto à la française, indulging in humorous, playful tone as well as tonal opulence: the sly Sonatine by Jean Françaix is followed by the passionate Exstase op. 21 by the Belgian violin giant Eugène Ysaÿe. Francis Poulenc's violin sonata, written in memory of Federico García Lorca, ends the first half of the concert with due seriousness. In the second part, the selected works simultaneously illuminate various career stages of their creators. The one-movement work from 1897, published as Sonata posthume, represents a composition from Maurice Ravel's not exactly easy study period, while Igor Stravinsky achieved world fame with the acclaimed Paris premiere of his ballet The Firebird. The Polish violin virtuoso and Ysaÿe teacher Henryk Wieniawski took advantage of the extraordinary popularity of Charles Gounod's Faust opera when he wrote himself a bravura piece, Fantaisie brillante sur des motifs de l'opéra "Faust" de Gounod op. 20.

Concert duration about 2 hours
Artist talk after the intermission