It is very common to associate the development of the orchestra predominantly with the growth of ensemble performance and with the musical genres that rely almost exclusively on it. In this project, it is argued that the emergence and major transformations of the orchestra were also powerfully shaped by solo performance. From the seventeenth century onwards, there was a tendency to accommodate the range and timbre of solo instruments within a larger sonic body. Thus, the emergence of the orchestra in the seventeenth century and its further evolution cannot be understood without reference to the instrumental concerto.

This project focuses on the concerto for orchestra between 1925 and 1943, aiming to fill the existing 18-year gap between the very first concerto for orchestra (Hindemith, 1925) and well-studied Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra (1943). Concertos for orchestra of Lucijan Marija Skerjanc (1926), Albert Roussel (1927), Conrad Beck (1928), Herman Unger (1929), Adolf Busch (1929), Ildebrando Pizzetti (1929), Winfried Zillig (1930), Othmar Steinbauer (1930), Gian Francesco Malipiero (1931), and other composers of the 1930s and early 1940s make it possible to reveal unprecedented flexibility in length and form, size and type of orchestra, and relationships between in-orchestra soloists and the orchestra, thereby enabling the first systematic and comprehensive study of the genre.

Consideration of the concerto for orchestra is inseparable from interest in Baroque music in the early twentieth century. To what extent did the rediscovery of Baroque in the early twentieth century influence certain compositional trends? How did music analysis, music theory, and historical music research of that time understand the concerto: as a genre or a form? Which Baroque concertos types and concerto models received particular attention in the context of the 1910s–1930s? How did they shape the composition of concertos in the 1920s and 1930s, relationships between soloist and orchestra, formal structures, or idiomatic genre features?

In order to accomplish the comprehensible examination of the concerto for orchestra, the following list of objectives was established: to identify the factors that contributed to the emergence of the genre; examine the relevant historical, political, and cultural contexts; provide theories as to why the concerto for orchestra emerged in the 1920s; establish the criteria (genre markers) that distinguish the concerto for orchestra from other symphonic genres; explore how national stylistic features shape the concerto for orchestra at harmonic, melodic and rhythmic levels; review the use or rejection of earlier concerto models; and classify the analysed concertos for orchestra.

This project is funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF / Scholars at Risk).

Project researcher
Vadym Rakochi 

Contact adress
Dr. habil. Vadym Rakochi
vadym.rakochi@clutterunibas.ch
Universität Basel
Petersgraben 27
4051 Basel