Rebecca Clarke - Viola Sonata [With score]
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- Опубліковано 9 лют 2025
- -Composer: Rebecca Clarke (27 August 1886 - 13 October 1979)
-Performers: Antoine Tamestit (viola), Ying-Chien Lin (piano)
00:00 - I. Impetuoso
07:20 - II. Vivace
11:09 - III. Adagio
Rebecca Clarke's Sonata for Viola and Piano is first known of in 1919, when the composer was 33 years old. Clarke had moved to the United States in 1916, after being disowned by her father. She had been supporting herself with some success as a soloist.
The first reference to the Viola Sonata was upon its submission to a composition competition sponsored by Clarke's neighbor, Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge. Out of 72 entries, Clarke's Sonata tied for first with a piece by the Swiss composer, Ernest Bloch. In the end Bloch was declared the winner, despite all the judges favoring Clarke-it was decided that declaring Clarke the winner would smack of favoritism on Coolidge's part. It was also suspected by some that the name "Rebecca Clarke" was a pen-name of a male composer, as few imagined the possibility of a competent female writing such music. The piece had its première at the Berkshire Music Festival in 1919, and was well received. It, along with the Piano Trio of 1921 and the Rhapsody for cello and piano of 1923, represent the zenith of her compositional career, though afterwards Clarke wrote hardly any more music. The sonata was first published in 1921 by Chester Music.
Clarke gives us an incipit on the first page of the sonata, a quote from La Nuit de mai (1835) by the French poet Alfred de Musset:
Poète, prends ton luth; le vin de la jeunesse
Fermente cette nuit dans les veines de Dieu.
Poet, take up your lute; the wine of youth
this night is fermenting in the veins of God.
The sonata is cast in three movements. The first movement, marked Impetuoso, begins with a vibrant fanfare from the viola, before moving on into a melodic and harmonic language reminiscent of Achille-Claude Debussy and Ralph Vaughan Williams, two important influences on Clarke's music. Her language is at times very chromatic and shows the invention of Debussy in the use of modes and the whole-tone scale. The second movement, marked Vivace, makes use of many interesting 'special effects' like harmonics and pizzicato. The final movement, Adagio, is both pensive and sensual in its language. However, Clarke works in a special surprise: a segue into a restatement of themes from the first movement. The sonata ends in a lush and brilliant pyrotechnical display, showing off the full range of the viola, as well as the piano (whose part is of equal difficulty.) Because of the many different obstacles the piece presents, as well as its highly idiomatic writing, it is becoming more and more a staple of the violist's repertoire.
[Wikipedia.org]
I just read that Rebecca Clarke's father chased her out of the house and disinherited her because she called him out for cheating multiple times on her mother. His loss, the world's gain. Go Becky!
I'm doing a music project oh her! She's really cool
My goodness. Can I just say to Mr Clarke, on behalf of all men? You, sir are a Class A Dickwad.
Disowned by her father? Wasn't he proud of such a daughter? Unbelievable!
Of course I find this AFTER my recital...
What an absolutely gorgeous piece though, this is quickly becoming my favorite viola sonata!
This and Shostakovich's are very different but I love them equally.
This is badass. Violas are frickin' awesome and violists are always such badasses.
И ничего мы не задиры, просто прекрасны)) 😊
My orchestra says otherwise
i like viola, but violists are meh in my experience
😂😂😂😂
I played piano part of this wonderful piece for the diploma of my gf, this February. It is one of the best chamber composition even written in the first half of 20th century!
😂
How is it that I've never heard of this composer? What an absolutely wonderful piece!!
Because she is a woman... i know it is sad the reason why we are not encoraged to study and play music written by women
@@iaf4454 I think it is unnecessary to bring sexism into this listening experience. I shouldn't need to feel extra virtuous about appreciating something a woman composed, historical bias or no; this piece has incredible depth and stands strongly upon its own merit. It is the best viola composition I've ever heard and easily in my top five favorite sonatas of any kind.
@@macchupicchu3 He answered why the music is not heard, not why you should appreciate it.
@@alejandrom.4680 Exactly! She was a woman who composed a few pieces in the late 1800's and won second place in 2 blind competitions. When the envelope was opened so to speak on who the 2nd place winner was, there was a bit of outrage as it was seen to be a "frivilous" aspiration for a "woman". The fact that she quit because of these attitudes probably robbed us of several masterpieces.
Macchu Picchu You missed the point please read the comments more carefully
I just finished reading Leah Broad's fabulous book "Quartet", which chronicles the lives of Dame Ethel Smyth, Rebecca Clarke, Dorothy Howell and Doreen Carwithen. I'm now on a mission to find more music by these women, but Clarke is my major priority: apparently her work got a lot more angular and modernist as she developed. If you're interested in her life and music, I thoroughly recommend "Quartet" - it's a great read, thoughtful, joyful, sobering and tragic by degrees. Thanks so much for posting this. Wonderful.
Excellent....BRAVA from Acapulco!
Сонаты альтовые прекрасные есть и немало, но как поэтично и супер вдохновенно и раскованно играют солисты ! Меня все убеждает и радует в исполнении этого прекрасного альтиста! Браво! ❤
Recently I was remembering when I was in grad school listening to Antoine play this piece at our weekly studio classes (and also his master's degree recital, IIRC). So I decided to work on it myself, having never actually worked on it before. After playing through it a couple of times on my own I decided to find a recording of it online and lo and behold, here's a recording of the very person who inspired me to revisit the piece! Thanks for posting this recording, it's such a kick-ass piece and Antoine is a kick-ass violist. I only hope I can learn to play it half as well as he does.
This sounds like a weird mix between Rach, Ravel, Debussy and modern film music and I love it
The genius of this sonata shows itself in the 3rd movement, it's second half constantly wavering between themes of the 3rd movement and the first theme heard in the sonata.
I just discovered Rebecca Clarke, whilst looking into the history of the viola. Thank you for sharing this lovely sonata of hers!
same! love her
Beautiful!
Reminds me a bit of another brilliant female composer of a similar era, Rosy Wertheim. Both with some truly striking work. Thank you for sharing.
After reading your comment a few years ago I started listening to Rosy Wertheim and now she's one of my favourite composers ever!
Beautiful piece!!very strong music ! Passionate ! Glad to get to know this composer! Thanks
I looked up "viola sonata" to see what there was. I like it. This piece is amazing.
Me too. The viola is so underrated
@@yasha12isreal It really is.
Also try Shostakovich
@@jackminto7062 I tried that one first, it didn't quite do it for me like this one did, personally.
What a beautiful piece of music for the viola ! I am so excited I found this as not much music was made for us.... quite difficult but the beauty is making me excited... I love the interpretation of this piece!
i found this when i finished listening to the shostakovich viola sonata and i fell in love with this piece! thank you!
Wow the rly good thing is that everyone in the comments has different favorite passages showing how good and colorful the entirety of the piece is
The passage from 2:50 is what I live for.
MadViolist imagine this passage in breath of the wild or something wow
oh my god I just cried at this part it was so good omfg
a wonderful piece and composer!
Indeed ;)
Impetuoso is now my favorite style marking
What a delightful piece, thanks for sharing!
The viola is such a good instrument, such a thicc sound
2:53 is just ❤️😭❤️🩹🔥
Ah, dear Damon!
You never disappoint us!
When I suggest it the other day I totally understand that you were very very busy and at first I felt a bit egoist by asking it, but I cleared stated that it was only a suggestion, not a request to avoid any pressure on your very busy schedule.
However, your love for music and for this channel never fails to amaze me. Usually I'm not this type of overemotional comments, but really, your work must be appreciated!
You're an inspiration, because I'm starting to consider to create my own score-videos channel ;)
Excellent choice! Yes thanks Damon!
Yes, thank you very much. I had been wanting to hear more of Rebecca Clarke's music. I heard some of her music for the 1st time, I think, just last Wednesday, which, being 8 March, was international Women's Day. So the CBC (public radio up here in Canada) in some of its classical music programming, dedicated some programs to compositions by women. In one program they broadcast the final movement of the Clarke 1923 piano trio, making comparisons to Ravel's piano trio. So as I said, I have been wanting to hear more of Rebecca Clarke's music. And lo & behold, I came across your post today. So thank you again for doing this! And of course, thanks to all who care so much about music & about sharing their joy that they do such wonderful things as loading recordings with scores! You all enrich the lives of so many! (So Torterra kart -- go for it! ;-) )
fabulous!
This is one of the most beautiful sonatas I've ever heard. In many aspects sounds better then sonatas from Beethoven and even Bach.
To be fair, I don't think Beethoven's violin sonatas are among either his best work or the best violin sonatas. They're fine, just don't reach the heights of other music in their same categories.
FFS
damn this is good. wandering around imslp really pays off
Perfect!!
This is lovely. I wonder if she knew Leo Ornstein. Their styles aren't wholly different.
My favorite part is from 0:38 - 1:30.
I notice that both the violist and the pianist often play eighth-note triplets as if they are and eighth note followed by two sixteenth notes.
I wanna play this so badly but... I’m not worthy... not yet
How about now?
you know what? i printed all 12 pages of this out tyesterday and started practicing
That's how I feel. Maybe someday, I'll be good enough to give this piece a portion of what it deserves
Same
3:10 beautiful
13:09 ❤
2:50 is so modern
👏
16:51 wow...
11:09 11:57 12:10 16:06 16:56
Sweet Rebbeca Clarke
I can't stand how Antoine plays the triplets like an eighth note and 2 sixteenth notes. The rhythmic inaccuracies are really distracting.
1:25 ST
7:36 my dog sneezed
9:21 9:30
Alfred de Musset brought me here
2. 7:21
11:09 -
Why the hell is a viola piece in treble clef and not in alto clef which is the viola clef
3:41
13:28
That adagio is fucking phat
Here's the issue I have with Rebecca Clarke: she uses the idea of a whole tone, harmonics, triplets, and quintuplets and that's about it! These musical components aren't new! I don't see anything special in her writing.
I love female composers such as Clarke Schumann, Dobrinka Tabakova and Sofia Gubaidulina because they're innovative! Clarke doesn't seem to offer much yet she has *somehow* secured a place in the standard viola repertoire....
When viola greats like Rysanov, Caussé, Rachlin, Bashmet, Ridout .... record her works I feel people love it for the way it was performed rather than the notes on the page/score....
Perhaps listen to the Clarke Sonata as a work from the time, not written in the 1960s.
@@profpf I do factor that in. Of course it comes out of nowhere as an unusual composition and that's why it is still played today. I look at it objectively too: if Ravel, Debussy, Stravinsky, Franck etc had written this I think people would've thought it was one of their weaker works and it wouldn't be mainstream repertoire.
That's a different point though.
Anyway, it's just my opinion and I'm worse off for not feeling any emotion from this piece.
Wait is Rysanov a composer? Where can I find his music? Ditto with Bashmet... I thought they were just performers
@@Greentrees60 Haha, you must've misread what I wrote. I never said they were composers - I just said that *they* perform other people's compositions.
The compositions are merely *dedicated* to them
@@liamnevilleviolist1809 you are right, I did!
yea
a
I don't like the rubato
Unforgivable sin.
WTF are you talking about?
Haha, starts off with "Impetuoso" ..... so, "impetuous" ...as is all of her work. Completely overrated music.
Edit: If I *have to* give her a compliment- the second movement, Vivace, is alright.
Boring
Totally derivative and boring.
rubbish, this is very original writing...and predates some of Ravel's masterpieces in case you are wondering.
@@nickyork8901 In fact, I was not wondering. Happy to clear that up for you.