Music Department

National Gallery of Art

Sixth Street and Constitution Avenue nw

Washington, dc

Mailing address

2000B South Club Drive

Landover, md 20785

www.nga.gov

The Sixty-third Season of

The William Nelson Cromwell and F. Lammot Belin

Concerts

National Gallery of Art

2,515th Concert

Henning Kraggerud, violinst

Helge Kjekshus, pianist

Presented in cooperation with 

the Embassy of Norway

12 December 2004

Sunday Evening, 6:30 pm

West Building, West Garden Court

Admission free
For the convenience of concertgoers

the Garden Cafe remains open until 6:oo pm.

The use of cameras or recording equipment during the

performance is not allowed. Please be sure that cell phones,

pagers, and other electronic devices are turned off.

Please note that concerts now begin at 6:30 pm.

Late entry or reentry after 6:30 pm is not permitted.

The National Gallery is pleased to present this concert in

cooperation with the Embassy of Norway as an event in the

eighth annual cultural festival, Norwegian Christmas at

Union Station. In addition to its gala inaugural event on

November 30, 2004, at which Her Highness Princess Martha

Louise lit the 8,000-light Christmas tree at Union Station, 

the festival offers a wide range of events at various venues in

Washington, all designed to highlight the traditions of Norway,

its culture, and the accomplishments ofits people.

2,515th Concert

12 December 2004, 6:30 pm

The Sonatas for Violin and Piano by Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)

Sonata for Violin and Piano No. 1 in G Major (“Regen”), Op. 78 (1876)

Vivace ma non troppo

Adagio

Allegro molto moderato

Sonata for Violin and Piano No. 2 in A Major (“Thun”), Op. 100 (1886)

Allegro amabile

Andante tranquillo; vivace

Allegretto grazioso (quasi andante)

Sonata for Violin and Piano No. 3 in D Minor, Op. 108 (1889)

Allegro

Adagio

Un poco presto e con sentimente

Presto agitato
The Musicians

Born in Oslo in 1973, violinist Henning Kraggerud has at an early age

achieved the status of one of Scandinavia’s most important musicians. He 

has performed with the Oslo Philharmonic, the Budapest Festival Orchestra,

the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic, the Prague Symphony, the Stockholm

Radio Orchestra, and the Deutsches Symphonie Orchester, as well as many

British orchestras, including the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, the

Bournemouth Symphony, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, the Halle 

Orchestra, and the BBC Symphony Orchestra. Among the world-renowned

conductors with whom Kraggerud enjoys a close working relationship

are Mariss Jansons and Kurt Sanderling.

A committed chamber musician, Henning Kraggerud performs regularly 

at many ofthe major international festivals, collaborating with musicians

such as Stephen Kovacevich, Kathryn Stott, Leif Ove Andsnes, Jeffrey Kahane,

Truls Mork, and Martha Argerich. In the spring of 2004, Kraggerud was

artist-in-residence at the Bergen International Music Festival, where he performed recitals, chamber music, and concertos. Later in 2004 he performed

in the Young Masters series at London’s Wigmore Hall.

In addition to this recital, his first at the National Gallery, Kraggerud

will perform on every continent except Antarctica in the 2004-2005

season. He will be a concerto soloist with the Norwegian Radio Symphony

Orchestra on its next Asian tour and will play his debut performances

with the Strasbourg Philharmonic, the Helsinki Philharmonic, the Hong

Kong Philharmonic, the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, the Saint

Petersburg Philharmonic, and the Baltimore Symphony (in May 2005,

at the new Strathmore Hall in Bethesda, Maryland). In spring 2005 he

joins Leif Ove Andsnes in his “Perspectives Season” at Carnegie Hall.

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Kraggerud enjoys a fine reputation as leader and soloist of chamber

orchestras and sinfoniettas. He is an innovative improviser and composer,

performing many of his own cadenzas and arrangements in concert, and

several of his compositions have been performed at festivals worldwide.

He has recorded three critically acclaimed CDs for Naxos: the Grieg violin 

sonatas (with Helge Kjekshus), a set of Norwegian pieces for violin and

orchestra, and the violin concertos of Jean Sibelius and Christian Sinding

with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. Kraggerud provided the

violin sound track for a soon to be released television and cinema documentary about the life of Norwegian violin virtuoso and composer Ole Bull

(1810-1880). A member ofthe faculty ofthe Barratt-Dues Conservatory

of Music and a recipient of Norway’s prestigious Grieg Prize, Henning

Kraggerud appears at the National Gallery by arrangement with IMG Artists

of New York City.

Pianist Helge Kjekshus graduated in 1990 from the Norwegian State

Academy of Music with the highest honors. He continued his piano studies

with Jiri Hlinka at the Grieg Academy of Music in Bergen, Norway, and with

Boris Berman at Yale University. In a review from the Bergen International

Festival, the Washington Post hailed Kjekshus as “a pianist who must be 

counted as one ofthe festival’s most exciting discoveries.” He has performed

with the Copenhagen Philharmonic and other major orchestras throughout

Scandinavia and the Baltic States. He has also appeared as soloist with the

Bern Symphony Orchestra, the Saint Petersburg State Symphony Orchestra,

and the Santa Fe Symphony Orchestra. He has performed solo and duo

recitals in international music festivals, including the Bergen International

Festival, the Risor Chamber Music Festival, and Kissinger Summer. A

devoted chamber musician, he has performed with Henning Kraggerud,

Ana Chumachenko, Paul Meyer, Truls Mork, and Boris Pergamenchikov.

Recipient ofthe Grieg Prize, Kjekshus is also in demand as a conductor of

chamber and symphony orchestras.

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Program Notes

One ofthe most famous and productive collaborative friendships between 

musicians ofthe nineteenth century was the one that brought together

Johannes Brahms and the violinist Joseph Joachim (1831-1907). The two

men became acquainted in the 1850s in Hannover, where Joachim was a

member ofthe resident string quartet that premiered a number of Brahms’

early chamber works. Joachim is credited with inspiring Brahms to write his 

three violin sonatas and his Concertofor Violin and Orchestra and with having 

influenced their character, since both the performer and the composer valued tone production and musical integrity over mechanical virtuosity.

As he did with all his chamber music, Brahms looked to classical models in forming his sonatas for violin and piano, reflected in the number of

movements and sequence oftempos that are presented in each ofthem.

Brahms introduced some modifications to the classical sonata, among them

an expansion and mellowing ofthe scherzo and complex rhythms that

were unknown in earlier music. The preference of Brahms and his favorite

violinist for moderate tempi is indicated by his use ofsuch terms as non

troppo, amabile, tranquillo, and grazioso to modify the basic tempo markings.

It is only in his third and last sonata that the composer opens the emotional

floodgates, calling upon the players to finish the work presto agitato (fast and

in an agitated manner).

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The nickname ofthe first sonata, Regen (Rain), refers to a song Brahms

wrote in 1873 (Regenlied), a portion ofwhich is heard in the first movement.

The nickname ofthe second, Thun, is the name ofthe town in Switzerland

where Brahms was staying when he completed it in the summer of 1886.

The third sonata was also written in Thun but has never been assigned a nickname, perhaps because it has a sufficient identity as a masterpiece among

violin sonatas. It represents an apotheosis for the composer and rises to a

level ofharmonic intensity and rhythmic complexity that is above that ofthe 

earlier sonatas. It presents equal challenges to both the violinist and the 

pianist and reveals the rugged passion ofwhich Brahms was capable, especially in the first and last movements. One ofthe unique achievements ofthis 

work is the creation ofintensely passionate music without resorting to key

changes, which were the most common source of dramatic tension in romantic music. In the first movement, there is a forty-six-bar passage in which the 

bass note remains the same (pedal point). Both instruments shift abruptly

from one tonality to another above the pedal point, creating and releasing harmonic tension without changing the key. Brahms and Joachim played the 

premiere performance ofthe third sonata in Vienna on February 13,1889.