In the early 1850s, Henryk Wieniawski was an unknown teenage violinist just starting out on his many years of wandering across Europe, giving concerts wherever there seemed to be anybody to listen. Such a wayfarer’s life was more or less a requisite for any nineteenth-century virtuoso seeking fame and fortune. Sometime around 1852 or 1853, he took a pair of popular Russian tunes and molded them into a concert piece for violin and orchestra (or piano), the Souvenir de Moscou, Op. 6.
– All Music Guide
In French, the world Souvenir means “remembrance,” and, as a musical form, it was a great vehicle for 19th-century soloists to wow their audiences with pyrotechnic displays of virtuosity, under the guise of a “remembrance” or “impressionss of” people, places, and things that tickled their imagination.
For our latest Video of the Week, as we head into our first-ever Heifetz Virtual Institute, we’re going to share a fond remembrance of our own: The very first Stars of Tomorrow concert of #Heifetz2015, when a then-unknown (to us, at least!) teenage violinist named Rachell Ellen Wong. joined by faculty pianist Andrew Rosenblum, walked onstage for the first time in Francis Audiitorium to dazzle and delight with Wieniaswki’s Souvenir de Moscou.
Relive the memory, and catch the newly-minted Avery Fisher Career Grant winner Rachell as she helps to open a new chapter in Heifetz history: She’ll be part of our Young Alumni Showcase and Preview Concert on June 1, launching Rubato, the Heifetz Institute’s new Virtual Concert Hall initiative.
The Polish virtuoso Henryk Wieniawski, the “unknown teenage violinist” on the verge of stardom.