Enna: Violin Concerto, Overture Cleopatra & Symphonic Fantasy
1/1/2015, 7 Tracks, 1:03:18
Featuring
Hermann Bäumer
Kathrin Rabus
NDR Radiophilharmonie
August Enna
Did you know?
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Composer Biography
Enna grew up in poverty and did not receive formal music instruction until age 17, working as a shoe shop salesboy and barroom pianist to access a piano.
Composer Biography
August Enna, a Danish composer, inherited his Italian surname from his paternal grandfather, a Sicilian soldier who settled in Denmark.
Critical Reception
Enna's opera 'The Witch' was called the most sensational since 'Carmen' and 'Cavalleria rusticana' in Prague and was performed in over forty European opera houses.
Composition History
After composing his opera 'The Witch', Enna discovered Wagner's 'Ring' and realized his own work was old-fashioned, leading him to rewrite his opera after half a year of intense study.
Critical Reception
Enna's 'Symphonic Fantasy' received almost no attention during his lifetime, with only two known performances, and his name was largely forgotten by 1974.
Compositional Technique
The second movement of Enna's Violin Concerto surprisingly opens with a direct quote from the famous aria 'Vesti la giubba' from Leoncavallo's opera 'I Pagliacci'.
Composer Biography
Enna's 'Cleopatra' opera caused a public dispute with his publisher, giving him a reputation as a 'firebrand' and creating lifelong adversaries in the cultural scene.
