Australian violinist Christian Li arrived on the scene with a spectacular joint first in the 2018 Menuhin Junior Competition in Geneva. As he was only 10 when he won, it was truly the launch of a violin phenomenon.
Christian Li
Iosif Kotek and Tchaikovsky, 1877
His new recording on Decca is an entire album of Tchaikovsky‘s music centered around the violin concerto. Tchaikovsky wrote the concerto in Switzerland, at the resort of Clarens, where he’d gone with his brother and some friends to recover from his disastrous marriage of 1877. Eventually, the violinist Iosif Kotek, a former student of Tchaikovsky’s, joined the party and was the source of the suggestion that Tchaikovsky write a violin concerto.
Thus inspired, Tchaikovsky took little more than a month to put onto paper a concerto that is known for its demanding nature: stamina and technical virtuosity are required in equal measure, but which are tempered by Tchaikovsky’s cantabile melodies. Technical but singing is difficult to accomplish, and Li handles it beautifully, particularly in the third movement.
The other works on the album are interesting arrangements, first the Russian Dance from Swan Lake, and then the Waltz of the Flowers from The Nutcracker Suite. Hearing these arranged for violin and orchestra brings out the beauty of Tchaikovsky’s writing.
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
The album closes with three pieces for violin and piano. The Valse sentimentale began its life in 1882 as a work for solo piano, but in this arrangement for violin and piano, it becomes a waltz for one.
The Valze-Scherzo, Op. 34, was always a violin piece and was written for Iosif Kotek before Tchaikovsky began work on the Violin Concerto. Later arranged for violin and orchestra, we hear it here in its original violin and piano version. It’s expressive and is more than just a dance piece, but has deeper characters hidden in the musical lines.
The final work, a Nocturne from his 6 Pieces for Piano, Op. 19, was quickly recognised by Tchaikovsky as worthy of other voices, and he soon arranged it for cello and orchestra. Long beloved by cellists, its move to the violin matches it with the feeling of the Valse sentimentale as a beautiful, lyrical dance that still calls to the heart.
In many ways, this album of Tchaikovsky is a mix of the familiar and the new. Although you know the Waltz of the Flowers, this arrangement by Paul Campbell brings out a lyrical side to the flowers with the addition of flourishes and solo lines. It dances with the music in a way that you rarely hear in the standard orchestral versions.
Christian Li: Tchaikovsky
Christian Li, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Jascha von der Goltz and Vasily Petrenko (conductors), Nicola Eimer (piano)
Decca 4870360
Release date: 21 February 2025
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