Composed 1889; six minutes

Next to Paganini, Spaniard Pablo Martin Melitón de Sarasate y Navascués ranked among the top 19^th century violin virtuosos.  As a gifted 12-year-old, he was presented with a Stradivarius violin and sent to Paris to study.  As a renowned virtuoso, he toured the world, widely praised for a fabulous technique, sweet tone and seamless bowing.  Some thought Sarasate's playing cold and short of emotion – but then ‘some’ were to say the same thing about Heifetz!  But we can judge for ourselves since Sarasate made a series of recordings for the Gramophone Company around 1904, becoming, along with Joachim, the first of the great violin virtuosos to do so.

Navarra, for two violins and piano, was written in 1899 and is a tribute to Sarasate’s birthplace.   Based on a Spanish dance known as the gaitas, it includes all the virtuoso violinist's tricks-of-the-trade, abounding in harmonics, double and triple stopping, tremolandos, left-hand pizzicatos, portamentos, rubatos and other ingredients that tend to look on paper as though they belong on an Italian menu.  In the concert hall, however, they all add up to a dazzling display of violin virtuosity and wizardry.

 — All program notes copyright © 2024 Keith Horner.   Comments welcomed: khnotes@sympatico.ca