Britten: Violin Concerto in D Minor, Op. 15 & Double Concerto for Violin, Viola & Orchestra in B Minor

Album review

Benjamin Britten pursued the concerto form mostly in his early years, later preferring more programmatic content. The two works here fit together well and are not terribly common. The Double Concerto for violin, viola, and orchestra was abandoned by Britten in 1932 in an essentially complete state, despite its having been praised by Britten's teacher, John Ireland. It was rediscovered only in 1997 and has been recorded a few times, probably never better than on this release by the ORF Vienna Radio Symphony and conductor Marin Alsop, with violinist Baiba Skride and violist Ivan Vukčević. Britten seems to have been under the spell of the lush melodicism of Alban Berg, although he does not abandon tonality. Alsop brings the music back to England a bit, giving it a welcome crispness. The Violin Concerto of 1940, very much reflective of its time with its ominous timpani opening, is hardly more common. It, too, seems to reflect Viennese influences with its gloomy final passacaglia. The work thrives on a cool, precise tone, and that is what it gets from Skride, one of the more underrated violinists on the scene. The two works were well recorded some months apart in 2021 and 2022 at the Radio Kulturhaus in Vienna, and it is not clear whether they were done as part of a planned project or realized later to be relevant to each other. Whichever is the case, the album is a vivid look at the ambitions of the young Britten.

© James Manheim /TiVo