Cello Concerto No. 1 in G minor, Op. 49 (1949)

Dmitri Kabalevsky composed his Cello Concerto No. 1 in G minor between 1948 and 1949; this work forms the centrepiece of a trilogy of concertos dedicated to young Russian musicians, alongside his Violin Concerto, Op. 48, and his Piano Concerto, Op. 50. The work was premiered in 1949 by the man to whom it was dedicated, the cellist Sviatoslav Knushevitzky, accompanied by an orchestra of students from the Moscow Conservatoire, and was an immediate success thanks to its accessible and conventional style. Kabalevsky composed his Cello Concerto No. 2 in C minor much later, in 1964, adopting a markedly more melancholic key whilst expanding the traditional orchestral line-up with the addition of a saxophone. The programme also includes a suite taken from Kabalevsky’s 1938 opera "Colas Breugnon", based on the novel by Romain Rolland, who had described the music as ‘full of life, cheerfulness and liveliness’ — comprising the famous overture as well as three scenes (‘Public Festival’, ‘Public Scourge’ and ‘Insurrection’) taken from the composer’s 1940 orchestral arrangement.

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1. Allegro · Meno mosso · Meno mosso · Con fuoco · Tempo I, ma meno mosso
2. Largo molto espressivo· Cadenza Molto espressivo · Tempo I
3. Allegretto · Poco più mosso · Ancora più mosso · L’istesso tempo, ma poco tranquillo e pesante · Più mosso, agitato · Tempo I · Cadenza · Più mosso, quasi presto · Poco sostenuto