‘ROTHSCHILD’S VIOLIN’ by ANTON CHEKOV
Saturday 27 July at 3pm (50 mins) Tickets £16 (conc £12)
Gerda Stevenson, narrator
Mithras Trio
Ionel Manciu, Violin
Leo Popplewell, Cello
Dominic Degavino, Piano
Shostakovich ~ Piano Trio No.2 in E minor, Op. 67
Chekov ~ Rothschild’s Violin, from ‘Novellas and Stories’, 1894
Yakov Ivanov, an ill-tempered village coffin-maker and violinist, has always hated the local orchestra’s popular Jewish flautist, Rothschild. When Yakov becomes sick after his long-suffering wife dies, he experiences an epiphany that leads to an extraordinary act of generosity that astonishes everyone who knows him.
Shostakovich began work on his klezmer/Jewish-inspired 2nd Piano Trio just 10 days after completing the orchestration of ‘Rothschild’s Violin’, an opera by his pupil Veniamin Fleishman who died at the Siege of Leningrad. For this performance, the movements and the story alternate.
More about the artists
Mithras Trio
Gerda Stevenson