Barber Cello Concerto | Alisa Weilerstein & Gemma New | New World Symphony (2023)

Barber Cello Concerto | Alisa Weilerstein & Gemma New | New World Symphony (2023)
巴伯大提琴協奏曲 | 艾莉莎‧韋勒斯坦與傑瑪‧紐 | 新世界交響樂團 (2023)

1,856 views Jul 23, 2026 #cello #classicalmusic #SamuelBarber
Enjoy an electrifying performance by esteemed cellist ‪@alisaweilerstein5505‬, conducted by ‪@gemmanewmusic‬!

Samuel Barber was teaching at his alma mater, the Curtis Institute, when he joined the war effort in 1942 as a member of the U.S. Army Airforce. In July 1945, with World War II finally ending, he avoided the two years of service that in principle remained for him (a firmly worded letter from conductor Serge Koussevitzky worked wonders) and refocused on composing concert works. During these months of 1945 he wrote his Cello Concerto, commissioned by none other than Koussevitzky, who hoped to premiere it in Boston with Raya Garbousova as soloist. That January, Barber spent several hours listening to Garbousova play through highlights from her repertoire so as to get a grasp of her special qualities as a cellist. He then sent her portions of the music as he completed them and incorporated technical suggestions she offered. The process was occasionally rocky, but Garbousova later recalled it as one of the most creative and fulfilling artistic experiences of her life—and it certainly led to a splendid, dazzling, technically hair-raising addition to her instrument’s repertoire.

Following the premiere, critical response was all over the map. Some of the adjectives that surface in write-ups of the concert: “nervous,” “jittery,” “spotty,” “brilliant,” “fragmentary,” “vague,” “tragical.” Nonetheless, the work was awarded the 1946 Award of the Music Critics Circle of New York following its first performance in town, echoing the on-target opinion Virgil Thomson had expressed when he reviewed the premiere for the New York Herald Tribune: “It is full of thought about musical expression in general and about the possibility for musical expression of the violoncello in particular. It is full of ingenious orchestral devices for accompanying the instrument without drowning it. And it is full of reasonably good tunes… The working up of these into a richly romantic, well-sustained structure is musical, masterful, thoughtful and not without a certain Brahms-like grandeur. The work has the feel of serious repertory about it and it is most advantageous for the cello, which has a lot to do all the time… And for all its occasional modernity of texture, it has the formal solemnity of Late Romanticism and an expansive melancholy of mood that makes it both adequate and suitable to a permanent place on the standard symphony orchestra programs.”

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