2-2-0-2; 0-2-0-0; strings
Commissioned for Yael Weiss by The Fromm Foundation at Harvard University.
Video contains excerpts of the work.
Aviv is a 21st-century tribute to Mozart, whose piano concerti I have always loved. Rossini described Mozart’s music as ‘the inspiration of my youth, the desperation of my mature years, and the consolation of my old age’. ‘Aviv’ is the modern Hebrew work for the season of spring, and the concerto is a lively and joyful piece. Written for a typical eighteenth-century orchestra (pairs of flutes, oboes, bassoons, and horns and strings) Aviv is a deconstruction of a Mozart concerto, using all the usual elements, such as an orchestral ritornello, solo ‘exposition’, slow movement and lively rondo, only to juxtapose them in unexpected ways. The piano begins the piece in what turns out be the wrong key (although it does become the key of the slow movement); the orchestra begins its ritornello but is briefly interrupted by the pianist, who proves unable to wait for the expected grand entrance. A ‘development’ is interrupted by a peaceful slow movement, based on a chorale-like theme first stated much later, at the beginning of the piano cadenza. The development tries to return, only to interrupted by a “rondo’ theme, then by a wrong-key recapitulation of the ‘second theme’. At the end, the piano cadenza leads to a final summation of the materials of the piece by both orchestra and the piano, culminating in a lively close. The concerto was commissioned by the piano Yael Weiss and supported be a great from the Fromm Foundation.