Chicago-based violinist Rachel Barton Pine has recorded thematic albums, early music, rediscoveries, tributes to Sarasate and other virtuoso music -- almost everything, in fact, other than warhorse, late-Romantic concertos. That lacuna in her output is remedied here with two famed concert showpieces, with Andrew Litton and the BBC Symphony Orchestra backing Pine. The Elgar Violin Concerto in B minor, Op. 61, comes with an interesting story: Pine planned to record the album with Sir Neville Marriner as conductor, and he in ...
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Chicago-based violinist Rachel Barton Pine has recorded thematic albums, early music, rediscoveries, tributes to Sarasate and other virtuoso music -- almost everything, in fact, other than warhorse, late-Romantic concertos. That lacuna in her output is remedied here with two famed concert showpieces, with Andrew Litton and the BBC Symphony Orchestra backing Pine. The Elgar Violin Concerto in B minor, Op. 61, comes with an interesting story: Pine planned to record the album with Sir Neville Marriner as conductor, and he in turn relayed to her performance insights given him by his teacher, Billy Reed, who worked with Elgar on the creation of the concerto. With that background, plus Pine's commitment to the work -- she claims to have marked up 89 difficult passages in the score and singled them out for practice -- the concerto crackles and sizzles. Sample the finale, where Pine keeps the long line going amid the spectacular arpeggios. The Bruch Violin Concerto No. 1 in G minor, Op. 26, is perhaps not...
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