Post by erik on Jul 25, 2015 11:49:54 GMT -5
Both the film scoring community and the classical music worlds lost a very great composer in James Horner on June 22, 2015. But he did leave a substantial body of work for people to mull over. His last work of any kind, for movies or the concert hall, is the double concerto for violin and cello that is in this week's Classical Works Spotlight.
James Horner: PAS DE DEUX (CONCERTO FOR VIOLIN, CELLO, AND ORCHESTRA)
For much of his creative life, James Horner had garnered a fair amount of critical acclaim for his motion picture scores. His first major film score had been The Lady In Red in 1979, but his Hollywood career really accelerated when he did the score for Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan, followed by 1983’s Brainstorm, and 1984’s Star Trek III: The Search For Spock. His long list of film scores would continue into the new millennium, with credits that would include the monstrous smash Titanic in 1997, as well as Braveheart; An American Tail; An American Tail: Fievel Goes West; Patriot Games; Clear And Present Danger; Aliens; Apollo 13; and Avatar. But like fellow film composers John Williams and Jerry Goldsmith, Horner also had a thing for creating works strictly for the concert hall. One such work was “Pas De Deux”, a double concerto for violin and cello that had been commissioned by the brother/sister team of Mari and Hakan Samuelsen. Horner, in-between his film scoring assignments, worked on this over a period of three years, from 2011 to 2014, and saw “Pas De Deux” premiered by the Samuelsens on November 13, 2014 in Liverpool as part of the 175th anniversary season of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, under the direction of their current music director, the Russian-born Vasily Petrenko. Critics noted the similarities to the works of Benjamin Britten and Ralph Vaughan-Williams in the work, believed to be the first-known work to combine these particular solo instruments in a concerto since Johannes Brahms’ famous 1888 Double Concerto. Horner, sadly, was killed in the crash of his Tunico turboprop aircraft in the Los Padres National Forest in northern Ventura County, California on June 22, 2015, depriving both the concert and film-scoring world of one of its leading lights of the last fifty years. Horner was only 61 years old at the time of his death.
Violin: MARI SAMUELSEN
Cello: HAKON SAMUELSEN
Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra/VASILY PETRENKO (Mercury)
Including:
Arvo Part: FRATRES (Violin: MARI SAMUELSEN) (Conductor: CLARK RUNDELL)
Giovanni Sollima: VIOLONCELLES VIBREZ! (Cellos: HAKON SAMUELSEN, ALISA WEILERSTEIN)
Ludovico Einaudi: DIVENIRE (MARI + HAKON SAMUELSEN) (Conductor: CLARK RUNDELL)
James Horner: PAS DE DEUX (CONCERTO FOR VIOLIN, CELLO, AND ORCHESTRA)
For much of his creative life, James Horner had garnered a fair amount of critical acclaim for his motion picture scores. His first major film score had been The Lady In Red in 1979, but his Hollywood career really accelerated when he did the score for Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan, followed by 1983’s Brainstorm, and 1984’s Star Trek III: The Search For Spock. His long list of film scores would continue into the new millennium, with credits that would include the monstrous smash Titanic in 1997, as well as Braveheart; An American Tail; An American Tail: Fievel Goes West; Patriot Games; Clear And Present Danger; Aliens; Apollo 13; and Avatar. But like fellow film composers John Williams and Jerry Goldsmith, Horner also had a thing for creating works strictly for the concert hall. One such work was “Pas De Deux”, a double concerto for violin and cello that had been commissioned by the brother/sister team of Mari and Hakan Samuelsen. Horner, in-between his film scoring assignments, worked on this over a period of three years, from 2011 to 2014, and saw “Pas De Deux” premiered by the Samuelsens on November 13, 2014 in Liverpool as part of the 175th anniversary season of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, under the direction of their current music director, the Russian-born Vasily Petrenko. Critics noted the similarities to the works of Benjamin Britten and Ralph Vaughan-Williams in the work, believed to be the first-known work to combine these particular solo instruments in a concerto since Johannes Brahms’ famous 1888 Double Concerto. Horner, sadly, was killed in the crash of his Tunico turboprop aircraft in the Los Padres National Forest in northern Ventura County, California on June 22, 2015, depriving both the concert and film-scoring world of one of its leading lights of the last fifty years. Horner was only 61 years old at the time of his death.
Violin: MARI SAMUELSEN
Cello: HAKON SAMUELSEN
Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra/VASILY PETRENKO (Mercury)
Including:
Arvo Part: FRATRES (Violin: MARI SAMUELSEN) (Conductor: CLARK RUNDELL)
Giovanni Sollima: VIOLONCELLES VIBREZ! (Cellos: HAKON SAMUELSEN, ALISA WEILERSTEIN)
Ludovico Einaudi: DIVENIRE (MARI + HAKON SAMUELSEN) (Conductor: CLARK RUNDELL)
