One of these was from the leading viola player William Primrose, who had been enormously impressed by a performance of Bartók’s Second Violin Concerto given by Yehudi Menuhin. The overall impression of the work is individual, darkly Romantic, and authentically Hungarian in inspiration.Īfter the major success of his Concerto for Orchestra, premiered in Boston in December 1944, Béla Bartók-who for the past few years had been comparatively neglected in his American exile-began to be showered with commissions for new works, only some of which he was able to fulfil in the ten months that were left to him. The disc is completed by a modern viola concerto by the film composer Miklós Rózsa. Serly’s own Rhapsody for Viola and Orchestra dwells somewhat within Bartók’s shadow, but is nevertheless a skilful and elaborate work with a rollocking finale. Almost immediately it was recognized as one of the major contributions to the small literature of concertos for the viola, and has been a cornerstone of the instrument’s repertoire ever since. William Primrose (who edited the viola part himself) was able to premiere Serly’s recension of the music on 2 December 1949, with the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra conducted by Antal Dorati. Serly was Bartók’s most constant and trusted Hungarian musician-friend in his last years in the USA. Of the three Hungarian works for viola and orchestra on this latest release, the best-known is Bartók’s viola concerto, completed after the composer’s death by Tibor Serly. Together with Hyperion he is recording all of the seminal twentieth-century works for the viola. The British viola player Lawrence Power continues to be acclaimed as one of the greatest performers of today.
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