Vaughan Williams and Grieg: Violin Sonatas Charlie Siem & Itamar Golan

• Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872 - 1958): Violin Sonata in A Minor:
• 1 Williams: Violin Sonata in A Minor: I. Fantasia 08:29
• 2 Williams: Violin Sonata in A Minor: II. Scherzo. Allegro furioso ma non troppo 05:51
• 3 Williams: Violin Sonata in A Minor: III. Tema con variazioni. Andante – Tempo del preludio ma tranquillo – Cadenza 13:07
• Edvard Grieg (1843 - 1907): Violin Sonata No. 2 in G Major, Op. 13:
• 4 Grieg: Violin Sonata No. 2 in G Major, Op. 13: I. Lento doloroso — Poco allegro — Allegro vivace — Presto 08:15
• 5 Grieg: Violin Sonata No. 2 in G Major, Op. 13: II. Allegretto tranquillo 06:07
• 6 Grieg: Violin Sonata No. 2 in G Major, Op. 13: III. Allegro animato 05:11
• Peer Gynt, Op. 23:
• 7 Grieg: Peer Gynt, Op. 23: Solveig's Song (Arr. for Violin and Piano by Charlie Siem) 04:49
• Total Runtime 51:49

Info for Vaughan Williams and Grieg: Violin Sonatas

The first-class pairing of Charlie Siem and Itamar Golan release their debut album with Signum; Between the Clouds invites the listener into a Parisian-styled ‘salon’ for an intimate performance of classic pieces for violin and piano.

Featuring pieces by Wieniawski (known for his Gallic elegance and Slavonic fire); the ‘wunderkind’ Godowsky; the Viennese master Friedrich (Fritz) Kreisler; the virtuosic Niccolò Paganini, and the mighty Sir Edward Elgar, this is certainly not one to be missed.

Ralph Vaughan Williams bridged the history of England’s sunset from Empire to Commonwealth. Musical revolution, two world wars, the New German School of Liszt and Wagner, Stockhausen, Boulez and the Darmstadt radicals framed his life. In the succession of major Anglo-Saxon composers, he commanded the high ground between Elgar and Britten, facing ‘the doubts and portents of a tragic age’ where his predecessor had ‘proudly’ summed up ‘the glories of the Victorian century’ (Bernard Shore). He has been called ‘the apotheosis of Englishness’, ‘the fountainhead of the … English national school’, a man ‘as English as Morley and Purcell’. In 1931, the year Constant Lambert staged Job at the ISCM Festival in Oxford, Aaron Copland, fresh from Brooklyn, jazz and Nadia Boulanger, arrogantly wrote him off as ‘the kind of local composer who stands for something great in the musical development of his own country but whose actual musical contribution cannot bear exportation … His is the music of a gentleman farmer, noble in inspiration but dull’. 15 years later, the critic Scott Goddard was to say: ‘There is no aspect of life foreign to him, none beyond the reach of his art; and that art, which is the most individual in the history of [British] music since Purcell, has reached a width of reference and a depth of comment never attained by musicians bred here … Nothing can be said conclusively about the workings of mind so protean and still magnificently active’. The ‘corpus of Vaughan Williams’s work will speak to generations of Englishmen of a great Englishman’s ranging thoughts, his love of the homely countryside, his piety, his inherited poetry, his adventurous mind and lofty ideals’ (Shore, 1949).

Charlie Siem, violin
Itamar Golan, piano

Charlie Siem
is one of today’s foremost young violinists, with such a wide-ranging diversity of cross-cultural appeal as to have played a large part in defining what it means to be a true artist of the 21st century.

Born in London to a Norwegian father and British mother, Siem began to play the violin at the age of three after hearing a broadcast of Yehudi Menuhin playing Beethoven’s Violin Concerto. He received a broad and thorough education at Eton College, before completing the intellectually demanding undergraduate degree programme in Music at the University of Cambridge. From 1998 to 2004 he studied the violin with Itzhak Rashkovsky in London at the Royal College of Music, and from 2004 he has been mentored by Shlomo Mintz.

Siem has appeared with many of the world’s finest orchestras and chamber ensembles, including the Bergen Philharmonic, Camerata Salzburg, Czech National Symphony, Israel Philharmonic, London Symphony, Moscow Philharmonic, Oslo Philharmonic, Rotterdam Philharmonic, and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. He has worked with top conductors such as Charles Dutoit, Edward Gardner, Zubin Mehta, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Sir Roger Norrington, Libor Pešek and Yuri Simonov. International festival appearances to date include Spoleto, St. Moritz, Gstaad, Bergen, Tine@Munch, Festival Internacional de Santa Lucía, and the Windsor Festival. Siem’s regular sonata partner is renowned pianist Itamar Golan.

Highlights of the previous seasons included concerto debuts in Mexico, Munich, and Milan; recitals in Norway with Itamar Golan; a debut with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and Maestro Charles Dutoit; and an eight-concert debut recital tour of Australia, culminating with a performance at the Sydney Opera House. Charlie Siem enjoys a strong presence in China, where during the 2016/2017 season he was named Cultural Ambassador of Nanjing, and gave fifteen concerts at major venues across the country (including Beijing, Harbin, Nanjing, Shanghai, Xiamen, and Xuzhou), a tour of the Bruch concerto with the Israel Philharmonic an Maestro Zubin Mehta ; Siem’s USA concerto debut ( Sibelius Concerto with Jacksonville Symphony and Music Director Courtney Lewis) ; a tour with the Czech National Symphony Orchestra; and a South American recital tour with Itamar Golan.

Charlie Siem has a varied discography and has made a number of recordings, including with the London Symphony Orchestra (Warner Classics, 2011) and Münchner Rundfunkorchester (Sony Classical, 2014).

A great believer in giving to worthwhile causes, Siem is an ambassador of The Prince’s Trust. He is also a Visiting Professor at Leeds College of Music in the UK and Nanjing University of the Arts in China. He gives masterclasses around the world at top institutions such as the Royal College of Music in London, and the Accademia di Musica in Florence.

Passionate about bringing classical music to new audiences around the world, in addition to his classical performance career Siem has revived the age-old violinistic tradition of composing virtuosic variations of popular themes, which he has done alongside artists including Bryan Adams, Jamie Cullum and The Who In 2014, he wrote his first composition – Canopy, for solo violin and string orchestra – which was commissioned by USA television station CBS Watch!, and recorded with the English Chamber Orchestra. Siem has also had numerous collaborations with fashion brands including Armani, Chanel, Dior, Dunhill, and Hugo Boss.

Charlie Siem plays the 1735 Guarneri del Gesù violin, known as the ‘D’Egville’.

Itamar Golan
For more than two decades, Itamar Golan has been partnering the most outstanding instrumentalists of our time. His work has brought him great critical acclaim, and he is one of the most sought after pianists of his generation, playing on the most prestigious stages around the world.

Born in Vilnius, Lithuania, his family emigrated to Israel when he was a year old. There he started his musical studies and at the age of 7, gave his first concerts in Tel-Aviv.

He was repeatedly awarded scholarships from the American-Israel Cultural Foundation which enabled him to study with Emanuel Krasovsky and his chamber music mentor, Chaim Taub. Later under a full scholarship from the New England Conservatory of Boston, he was chosen to study with Leonard Shure.

Since his earliest years, Itamar Golan’s passion has been chamber music but he has also appeared as soloist with some of the major orchestras, including the Israel Philharmonic and the Berlin Philharmonic under the direction of Zubin Mehta, Royal Philharmonic under the direction of Daniele Gatti, the Orchestra Philharmonica della Scala, the Vienna Philharmonic under the direction of Riccardo Muti and Philarhomia Orchestra under the direction of Lorin Maazel.

Over the years, he has collaborated with Vadim Repin, Maxim Vengerov, Julian Rachlin, Mischa Maisky, Shlomo Mintz, Ivry Gitlis, Ida Haendel, Kyung Wha Chung, Sharon Kam, Janine Jansen, Martin Frost and Torleif Thedeen among many others.

He is a frequent participant in many prestigious international music festivals, such as Salzburg, Verbier, Lucerne, Tanglewood, Ravinia, and has made a numerous recordings for big labels as Deutsche Grammophon, Warner Classics, Decca, Teldec, EMI and Sony Classical.

In 1991, Itamar Golan was nominated to the faculty of the Manhattan School of Music, making him one of their youngest teachers ever. Since 1994, he has taught chamber music at the Paris Conservatory. Itamar resides in Paris, where he is involved in many different artistic projects.

Booklet for Vaughan Williams and Grieg: Violin Sonatas