Violin concerto (Berg)

Alban Berg's Violin Concerto was written in 1935 (the score is dated 11 August 1935). It is probably Berg's best-known and most frequently performed instrumental piece, in which the composer sought to reconcile diatonicism and dodecaphony.

The piece stemmed from a commission from the violinist Louis Krasner. When he first received the commission, Berg was working on his opera Lulu, and he did not begin work on the concerto for some months. The event that spurred him into writing was the death by polio of 18-year-old Manon Gropius, the daughter of Alma Mahler (once Gustav Mahler's wife) and Walter Gropius. Berg set Lulu aside to write the concerto, which he dedicated "To the memory of an angel".

Berg worked on the piece very quickly, completing it within a few months; it is thought that his working on the concerto was largely responsible for his failing to complete Lulu before his death on 24 December 1935 (the violin concerto was the last work that Berg completed).

In a letter to Krasner dated 16 July 1935, Berg confessed: Yesterday I finished the composition [without the orchestration] of our Violin Concerto. I am probably more surprised by it than you will be (...) the work gave me more and more joy. I hope - no, I have the confident belief - that I have succeeded.

The work was premiered after the composer's death, with Krasner playing the solo part, on 19 April 1936, in Palau de la Música Catalana, Barcelona.

The concerto is scored for 2 flutes (both doubling as piccolo), 2 oboes (one doubling as a cor anglais), alto saxophone (doubling as 3rd clarinet), 2 clarinets, bass clarinet, 2 bassoons, contrabassoon, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 2 trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, harp and strings.

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