Pierre Wissmer (1915-1992)
Concerto pour violon et orchestre n° 1
Concerto pour violon et orchestre n° 2
Concerto pour violon et orchestre n° 3

Oleg Kaskiv, violon
Sinfonia Varsovia
Aleksandar Markovic, direction

As a composer who developed an original language, Pierre Wissmer travelled through the 20th century with total independence. He composed an abundant body of work covering all musical genres: nine symphonies, several concertos, ballets, music for radio programmes, chamber music and vocal pieces. The three violin concertos bear witness to the composer’s aesthetic evolution. From the modal anchoring of the first concerto, composed in 1942 in the wake of the first symphony and the first piano concerto, he moved on to a writing style that sometimes borrows from the twelve-tone language in his second concerto, composed in 1954. Finally, the tonal suspension of the third concerto (1987) reflects a spirit of great freedom characteristic of the composer’s last works. Despite their differences, the three violin concertos reveal a profound stylistic unity shaped by an extreme taste for formal construction, the art of counterpoint and the science of orchestration.