Brahms: Violin Concerto; Bartók: Violin Concerto No.1 Janine Jansen

• Johannes Brahms (1833–1897): Violin Concerto in D, Op.77
• 1 1. Allegro non troppo 22:13
• 2 2. Adagio 08:28
• 3 3. Allegro giocoso, ma non troppo vivace - Poco più presto 08:02
• Violin Concerto No.1 (Op.posth), Sz36
• 4 1. Andante sostenuto 08:40
• 5 2. Allegro giocoso 11:46
• Total Runtime 59:09

Info for Brahms: Violin Concerto; Bartók: Violin Concerto No.1

Two landmark concertos receive sensational performances in Janine Jansen’s latest recording for Decca. The Dutch violinist, described by The Times as “a player you follow wherever she leads”, presents her profound insights into Johannes Brahms’s monumental Violin Concerto and youthful Béla Bartók’s Violin Concerto No. 1. She recorded the Brahms with the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia and the Bartók with the London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Sir Antonio Pappano. Jansen’s past Decca releases have achieved astonishing success in the digital music charts, earning her the title of “Queen of the Download” (Independent) and No. 1 positions in the iTunes pop and classical charts.

Janine Jansen first performed Brahms’s Violin Concerto with Antonio Pappano in 2012, developing a visionary interpretation of the work over the course of eight concerts.

“I remember feeling very excited to be working with him, but nothing had prepared me for the sheer passion and energy that he generates from an orchestra,” she recalls. “Most especially he encourages a singing, radiant cantabile.”

The violinist and conductor returned to the score in February 2015, expressing its magical blend of lyrical beauty and symphonic power in three performances recorded live in vibrant high-definition sound by Decca.

Jansen is the first major artist to couple the two works on the same album. “To me they seem a natural pairing,” she observes.

Janine Jansen’s Decca recording of the Brahms concerto can be heard in the soundtrack of Public Works (Publieke werken), a major new Dutch feature film scheduled for release on 10 December 2015. Public Works is based on Thomas Rosenboom’s eponymous novel, set in the 1880s, about an Amsterdam violin maker, his nephew, a country pharmacist, and simmering tensions within late nineteenth-century society.

Brahms was inspired to create his only violin concerto in the summer of 1878 by his old friend, the violinist and composer Joseph Joachim. The work includes fiendishly difficult passages written to suit Joachim’s long fingers and a finale filled with the energy and spice of Hungarian gypsy music. Bartók’s first violin concerto, written in 1907-08 but not published until the late 1950s, also includes elements of traditional music from the composer’s native Hungary. Its strongest influence, however, proved to Steffi Geyer, the strikingly beautiful young Hungarian violinist with whom Bartók was deeply in love.

“Jansen’s strong attack and rhythmic acuity created an engaging account of the gypsy-inspired finale, and she displayed exquisite delicacy and cantabile phrasing in her quietly impassioned reading of the slow movement.” - Concert review of Brahms’s Violin Concerto, Sydney, The Australian (March 2015)

Janine Jansen, violin
London Symphony Orchestra
Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia
Antonio Pappano, condutor

Janine Jansen
is internationally recognised as one of the great violinists and a truly exciting and versatile artist. Her London debut in November 2002, with the Philharmonia Orchestra and Vladimir Ashkenazy, was quickly followed by invitations from some of the world’s most prestigious orchestras, including the Berliner Philharmoniker, Royal Concertgebouw, London Symphony and Mahler Chamber orchestras, as well as the Chicago Symphony, The Philadelphia, Cleveland and NHK Symphony orchestras. She has worked with such eminent conductors as Valery Gergiev, Mariss Jansons, Lorin Maazel, Riccardo Chailly, Neeme and Paavo Järvi, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Daniel Harding, Edo de Waart, Gustavo Dudamel and Yannick Nézet-Séguin.

Jansen has an exclusive recording contract with Decca (Universal Music). Her most recent release is a French recital disc entitled Beau Soir with pianist Itamar Golan. Each one of her previous five albums has been awarded a Platinum Disc for sales in The Netherlands. Renowned for her success on iTunes, her recordings have reached number one on the digital charts on a number of occasions.

Highlights of the 2010/11 season include performances with the New York Philharmonic, London Philharmonic, Oslo Philharmonic, Danish National Symphony orchestras and the Orchestre de Paris. Janine Jansen will be touring this season with both the London Symphony Orchestra and the Philharmonia Orchestra. She also toured Japan with Die Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen. In the 2009/10 season Janine Jansen curated her own ‘Carte Blanche’ series at Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, and this year is Artist-in-Residence for the hr-Sinfonieorchester, which includes a number of projects as well as a European Tour.

In addition to her concerto performances, Janine is a devoted performer of chamber music and is performing a number of recitals featuring the music from her latest album with Itamar Golan; cities include Paris, London, Dortmund, Brussels and Frankfurt. She established and curates the annual International Chamber Music Festival in Utrecht, and since 1998 she has been a member of Spectrum Concerts Berlin, an important chamber music series in the Berlin Philharmonie. Her chamber partners include Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Mischa Maisky, Julian Rachlin, Itamar Golan, Martin Fröst, Khatia Buniatishvili, Leif Ove Andsnes and Torleif Thedéen.

A former BBC New Generation Artist, Janine studied with Coosje Wijzenbeek, Philipp Hirshhorn and Boris Belkin. In September 2003, Janine received the Dutch Music Prize from the Ministry of Culture – the highest distinction an artist can receive in The Netherlands. She has received numerous other awards including the Edison Klassiek Public Award three times, three Echo awards for her Vivaldi recording in 2006, her Mendelssohn/Bruch album in 2007 and her Beethoven & Britten Violin Concertos disc in 2010, which was awarded top prize in the Concerto Recording of the Year category (for 20th and 21st Century music), as well as the NDR Musikpreis for outstanding artistic achievement in 2007. In 2008 she was given the VSCD Klassieke Muziekprijs for individual achievement, in May 2009 she received the RPS Instrumentalist Award for performances in the UK and in February 2010 an Edison Award followed for her Beethoven/Britten CD, in the “Concerts” category. In the same month the recording also won a Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik.

Booklet for Brahms: Violin Concerto; Bartók: Violin Concerto No.1