Vladimir Dukelsky (Vernon Duke, 1903-1969)
Violin Concerto in G minor
I. Allegro molto 0:00
II. Valse: Tempo di valse (Animato) 9:45
III. III. Tema con variazioni: Risolutissimo 15:02
Var. 1: Non troppo moderato
Var. 2: Poco lamentoso
Var. 3: Giocoso (Allegretto non troppo)
Var. 4: Sostenuto e pesante
Var. 5: Andantino
Var. 6 e coda: Ben ritmato - Allegretto - Allegro non troppo
Ruth Posselt, violin
Boston Symphony Orchestra
Richard Burgin, conductor
Vernon Duke (1903 - 1969) was an American composer/songwriter, who also wrote under his original name, Vladimir Dukelsky. Vladimir Aleksandrovich Dukelsky was born into a noble family of mixed Georgian-Austrian-Spanish-Russian descent, in Parafianovo, Vilna Governorate, Russian Empire (in present-day Belarus). At the age of 11, Dukelsky was admitted to the Kiev Conservatory where he studied composition with Reinhold Glière and musical theory with Boleslav Yavorsky. In 1919, his family escaped from the turmoil of civil war in Russia and spent a year and a half with other refugees in Constantinople. In 1921, they obtained American visas and sailed steerage class on the SS King Alexander to New York. It was in 1922 in New York that George Gershwin befriended the young immigrant; Gershwin (himself born Jacob Gershowitz) suggested Dukelsky truncate and Americanize his name. Dukelsky's first songs published under his nom de plume were conceived that year, but he continued to write classical music and Russian poetry under his given name until 1955. In 1924, the restless young man left hospitable America for the Old World. In Paris, he received a commission from Serge Diaghilev to compose a ballet. Dukelsky's first theatrical production, Zephyr and Flora, was staged in the 1925 season of Ballets Russes, with choreography by Léonide Massine and scenography by Georges Braque, to great critical acclaim. Dukelsky's First Symphony was premiered by Serge Koussevitzky and his orchestra in 1928 in Paris. In the late 1920s, Dukelsky shared his time between Paris, where his more classical works were performed, and London where he composed numbers for musical comedies under the pen name of Vernon Duke. In 1929, he returned to the United States with an intention of settling in the country permanently. He composed and published much serious music, but devoted even greater efforts to establishing himself on Broadway. The support and devotion of Serge Koussevitzky, who published Dukelsky's chamber music and conducted his orchestral scores, helped him develop his more classical works. Dukelsky's concerto for piano, orchestra and soprano obbligato titled Dédicaces (1935–1937), was premièred by Koussevitzky and the Boston Symphony Orchestra in January 1939 in New York. His oratorio, The End of St. Petersburg, was premiered a year earlier by Schola Cantorum and the New York Philharmonic under Hugh Ross. In 1937, the composer was asked to complete Gershwin's last score, a soundtrack to a Technicolor extravaganza The Goldwyn Follies, for which he contributed two parody ballets, choreographed by George Balanchine, and a song "Spring Again". In 1939, Dukelsky became an American citizen and took Vernon Duke as his legal name. Between 1942 and 1944, he joined the Coast Guard and, while in service he discovered Sid Caesar, a saxophone player in the Coast Guard Band, and wrote a touring show for the Coast Guard called Tars & Spars. He also conceived some of his finest music in the classical tradition, including a Cello Concerto (commissioned by Gregor Piatigorsky) and a Violin Concerto. His pensive Third Symphony (1946) was dedicated to the memory of Koussevitzky's wife, Natalie. With years, both Serge and Natalie Koussevitzky, Dukelsky's devoted supporters, became a sort of surrogate family to him. When Dukelsky's own mother died in 1942, the composer took the conductor's refusal to officially commission this work with great bitterness. The dedication was revoked and the relationship soured. In 1946, Duke left the United States for France, where he continued his double career of being a classical composer and a songwriter. By 1948, the composer was back in America. He moved from New York to California where he spent his last decades, writing songs, film and theater scores, chamber music, poetry in Russian and polemical articles and memoirs in English. On October 30, 1957, he married singer Kay McCracken. His final appearance on Broadway came less than two weeks later with the two songs and incidental music he wrote for the Helen Hayes show, Jean Anouilh's Time Remembered. He continued to try to mount Broadway musicals during the last decade of his life, including two shows that closed during tryouts, and one was never produced. Duke died in Santa Monica, California on 16 January 1969, during surgery for lung cancer.
