By Eileen Wingard
SAN DIEGO — The decorated French-born violinist, Jacques Israelievitch, who served as assistant concertmaster of the Chicago Symphony, then concertmaster of the St. Louis Symphony followed by a two-decade stint as concertmaster of the Toronto Symphony, undertook a marathon performance challenge: playing three violin concerti in one evening!
The three concerti, performed with the Tifereth Israel Community Orchestra, were composed by the most famous composers of the classical literature, often linked together as the three “Bs,” Bach, Beethoven and Brahms.
The Bach concerto No. 2 in E major opened with a rhythmical Allegro, whose beats were over-emphasized by an electronic keyboard programmed to sound like a harpsichord. In the second movement, Israelievitch shaped the lovely phrases with a sweet tone and the keyboard accompaniment was less prominent. It was the most pleasing of the three movements. The last movement, Allegro Assai, was also characterized by the keyboard imbalance. A small ensemble from TICO accompanied the concerto and Israelievitch served as conductor as well as soloist.
For the Beethoven, David Amos mounted the podium. The soloist, seasoned orchestral player that he was, performed all the tutti passages along with the orchestra. This gave them more weight and prominence, inspiring the strings to play with full sound. Here again, the slow movement was a stand out, with beautifully-arched phrases. The last movement had admirable dynamic contrasts and the soloist’s tight rhythmical figures propelled the piece to a delightful conclusion.
The Brahms Concerto was the most impressive, with the Romantic configurations of the violin line weaving around the orchestra’s melodic themes and the bold fanfare-like chords pronounced with great confidence.
The slow movement, with nice woodwind solos, led to the Hungarian Dance last movement, played with vigor and excitement.
After accepting applause and a standing ovation, Jacques Israelievitch returned to play a movement from one of Bach’s unaccompanied Suites, which he called a lullaby.
This 65 year-old artist, who has a number of recordings to his name and has taught at Indiana University and currently teaches at the University of Toronto, the Royal Conservatory of Music and York University, spends summers teaching violin performance and chamber music at Chautauqua, New York, where the New Arts Trio, of which he is the violinist, serves as the resident trio.
Israelievitch, a close friend of Conductor David Amos, has been a featured soloist before with TICO, including a performance with his son, Michael, a percussionist with whom he has formed the Israelievitch Duo.
The large audiences at the two concerts were treated to an unusual violinistic fete, the marathon performance of three challenging concerti in one program.
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Wingard is a freelance writer and a retired violinist with the San Diego Symphony. She may be contacted at eileen.wingard@sdjewishworld.com