MILAN HUDNIK (VIOLONČELO) - ŽIGA BRANK (VIOLINA): KODÁLY - ŠKERJANC

Classical and Modern Music

Format: CD

Code: 114991

EAN: 3838898114991

Zoltán Kodály (1882 – 1967) was one of the most outstanding personalities in 20th Century music: composer, ethnomusicologist, music pedagogue, and linguist. His internationally-acknowledged concept of music education is the basis for general music teaching in Hungary in primary and secondary schools and also plays an important role in the training of professional musicians.
Sonata for cello solo, op. 8 of 1915 is one of the most important pieces for the solo cello. The first movement begins with strong musical gestures, and then varies between tenderness and anger. The Adagio is introduced by a dark melodic line, which is later replaced by a flexible melody in descant accompanied by sonorous pizzicato ostinato. After a contentious central part, the music becomes quiet again and, combined with occasional emotional outbursts, it gives the impression of solitude and distress. In the third movement, the composer takes us into the world of Hungarian folk music. This vast, lively, and diverse movement contains virtuoso variations full of pizzicatos, double stops and rapid passages, and leads to an exciting conclusion.
Zoltán Kodály wrote the Duo for Violin and Cello, op. 7 at the beginning of World War I, but it was not presented until ten years later in Salzburg. The piece became a basic element in the repertoire of this kind of duo. In the first movement, the two instruments play rhapsodic folk melodies. The cello solo leads us to a calm Adagio and, after the dramatic entrance of the violin, it develops into an intensive unanimous peak. The finale begins with narrative recitals in the violin and, with the entry of the cello, the movement is translated into a sparkling and virtuoso Presto.
Milan Hudnik

Lucijan Marija Škerjanc (1900 – 1973) was one of the most prominent and influential Slovene musicians, scholars, artists, publicists, and pedagogues. He was a genuinely educated marvellous composer, with an oeuvre that is convincing and diverse. His language of music has deep roots in the traditions of the 19th Century with all the compositional results and dimensions, though he was not afraid to reach out for new techniques for impressionism and dodecaphony either. He preferred the language of music which talks to us with a sense of melody and rich harmony and with the dramaturgy of elements of the traditional linear and vertical sound. This is characteristic for all his oeuvre, in which there was a special place for pieces for the cello.
Sonata for cello solo, which Škerjanc wrote between 1935 and 1941 is one of his earlier pieces. It was written in the first stage of his oeuvre, which lasts until World War II, yet he demonstrates features of a more mature composer. In the difficult part of the piece for the cello, his rich knowledge of composition and experience can be recognised. The piece is a suite, one that is oriental and colourful, its composition is rich in all the elements, is formally narrative and based on core motifs. Thus, the composer constructs his own variety of fantasies in the Prelude, Round dance, Aria and Rhapsody. All the movements are brilliant for cello, virtually full of all the different sounds that the cello can make. 
Andrej Misson, Ph.D.

Milan Hudnik finished his graduate and post-graduate studies at the Ljubljana Academy of Music. He has won many state and international competitions and has participated in the Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra. In addition to concerts with pianist Hermina Hudnik, he achieved great success with his solo cello performances in Slovenia, Italy, and the United States of America. He is the deputy soloist in the Symphony Orchestra of RTV Slovenija, a founding member of the Chamber Orchestra of the Society of Slovenian Composers, a member of the Neofony ensemble, and a teacher at the Conservatory of Music and Ballet in Ljubljana.

Violinist Žiga Brank is a professor of violin at the Conservatory of Music and Ballet Ljubljana, and since 2015 he also teaches at the Ljubljana Academy of Music. As a soloist he has performed with numerous orchestras. In countries around Europe, his critics have rated him critically as technically brilliant and have emphasized his sophisticated sense of interpretation and convincing mediation of music to listeners.

Zoltán Kodály (1882 - 1967)
            Sonata for cello solo, op. 8 (1915)
1          I        Allegro maestoso ma appassionato (listen!)
2          II       Adagio (con grand’ espressione)
3          III       Allegro molto vivace             

            Duo for violin and cello, op. 7 (1914)
4          I        Allegro serioso, non troppo
5          II       Adagio. Andante
6          III      Maestoso e largamente, ma non troppo lento. Presto    

Lucijan Marija Škerjanc (1900 - 1973)
            Sonata for cello solo (1935)
7          I        Preludio
8          II       Kolo
9          III      Aria
10        IV     Rapsodia

Milan Hudnik, violoncello
Žiga Brank, violin