Béla Bartók

Béla Viktor János Bartók (/ˈbɑːrtɒk/; Hungarian pronunciation: [ˈbeːlɒ ˈbɒrtoːk]; 25 March 1881 – 26 September 1945) was a Hungarian composer and pianist. He is considered one of the most important composers of the 20th century; he and Liszt are regarded as Hungary's greatest composers (Gillies 2001). Through his collection and analytical study of folk music, he was one of the founders of comparative musicology, which later became ethnomusicology. On 1 January 2016 his work entered the public domain in the European Union.

Biography

Childhood and early years (1881–98)

Béla Bartók was born in the small Banatian town of Nagyszentmiklós in the Kingdom of Hungary, Austria-Hungary (since 1920 Sânnicolau Mare, Romania) on 25 March 1881. Bartók had a diverse ancestry. On his father's side, the Bartók family was a Hungarian lower noble family, originating from Borsodszirák, Borsod county (Móser 2006a, 44). Although, his father's mother was of a Roman Catholic Serbian family (Bayley 2001, 16). Béla Bartók's mother, Paula (born Paula Voit), was an ethnic German, though she spoke Hungarian fluently (Bayley 2001, 16).

Violin sonata

A violin sonata is a musical composition for violin accompanied by a keyboard instrument and in earlier periods with a bass instrument doubling the keyboard bass line. The violin sonata developed from a simple baroque form with no fixed format to a standardised and complex classical form. Since the romantic age some composers have pushed the boundaries of both the classical format as well as the use of the instruments.

The early violin sonata

In the earliest violin sonatas a bass instrument and the harpsichord played a simple bass line (continuo) with the harpsichord doubling the bass line and fixed chords while the violin played independently. The music was contrapuntal with no fixed format. Telemann wrote many such sonatas as did Bach. Bach later wrote sonatas with the harpsichord obbligato, which freed the keyboard instrument from playing only a bass line accompaniment.

Haydn wrote over one hundred trio sonatas (which are essentially obbligato violin sonatas) with the use of the piano instead of the harpsichord and a baryton (a deeper cello like instrument) which mostly copied the piano's bass line. These works were mostly simple two movement sonatas of which the later ones used the sonata form.

Violin Sonatas (Grieg)

Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg wrote three violin sonatas. They are all examples of his musical nationalism, since they all contain references or similarities to Norwegian folk song.

The three Sonatas for violin and piano by Edvard Grieg were written between 1865 and 1887.

Violin Sonata No. 1 in F major, Op. 8

Grieg composed this sonata in the summer of 1865 while on holiday with Benjamin Feddersen in Rungsted, Denmark, near Copenhagen. The piece was composed shortly after his only piano sonata was completed that same summer.

Concerning the piece, Norwegian composer Gerhard Schjelderup commented: it is "the work of a youth who has seen only the sunny side of life." Despite this, many sections of the work are quite dark and turbulent.