IDAGIO | Schumann: Hermann and Dorothea Overture - Overture, Scherzo and Finale

Featuring

Stewart Robertson
Elmar Oliveira
Atlantic Classical Orchestra
Robert Schumann
Miscellaneous

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Performer Biography

Elmar Oliveira, the violinist on this recording, is the first and only American violinist to win the Gold Medal at Moscow's Tchaikovsky International Competition and the first violinist to receive the prestigious Avery Fisher Prize.

Composer's Artistic Vision

Schumann's intense involvement with both literature and music led to a creative personality that some describe as verging on 'artistic schizophrenia,' yet it resulted in a unique and consistently visionary body of work.

Composition History

The Overture, Scherzo and Finale, Op. 52, was composed during a period of intense creativity for Schumann between 1840-42, shortly after he was finally able to marry his beloved Clara.

Composer Biography

Robert Schumann, a prominent figure of the Romantic era, faced personal challenges including a hand injury that ended his dream of becoming a concert pianist and a protracted struggle to marry Clara Wieck, his piano teacher's daughter.

Compositional Technique

In works like his Fourth Symphony and the Overture, Scherzo and Finale, Schumann developed a 'cyclic' technique, using recurring themes and motives with literary or extra-musical associations to create structural cohesion.

Composition History

Schumann's Violin Concerto, written in 1853 for the virtuoso Joseph Joachim, was his last major work before his mental decline and was composed in an astonishingly short 13 days.

Critical Reception

The Violin Concerto languished in obscurity for 80 years after Schumann's death, as Joseph Joachim and Clara Schumann decided against its publication, and its eventual premiere in 1937 was met with equivocal critical reception.