Tchaikovsky's
sole concerto for violin, composed in the spring of 1878, had a rocky beginning,
somewhat like that of his First Piano Concerto, which after being rejected by
its original dedicatee, was introduced by a different soloist and scored a
tumultuous success. In this case, though, the premiere was both somewhat delayed
and far less successful than that of the Piano Concerto (which remains even now
probably the most enduringly popular concerto ever). Tchaikovsky offered his
Violin Concerto to Leopold Auer, the brilliant Hungarian-born violinist, long
based in Moscow, who now is remembered primarily as a pedagogue--the teacher of
such virtuosi as Jascha Heifetz and Nathan Milstein. As Nikolai Rubinstein had
done in the case of Tchaikovsky's First Piano Concerto (if perhaps in somewhat
more tactful accompanying remarks), Auer declared the Violin Concerto"unplayable";
the dedication was eventually given to Adolf Brodsky, who happily accepted it
and gave the work's premiere in Vienna on December 4, 1881. While this
background is well known, the part played by a third violinist in bringing this
immensely beloved concerto into being is hardly known at all--nor is his name
itself, though it is actually to him that the work owes its very existence.Yosif Kotek (1855-1885), said to have had an exceptional talent as a violinist, also studied with Tchaikovsky at the Moscow Conservatory, and a friendship developed between them. Upon his graduation in 1875 Kotek was engaged by Nadezhda von Meck, on Rubinstein's recommendation, to perform new music with her in her home, and it was he who brought Tchaikovsky to the attention of the woman who became the composer's patron. Without Mme von Meck to turn to with his confidences (always in the form of correspondence) and Kotek to talk to, Tchaikovsky might not have survived the disastrous marriage he entered into in July 1877. In the fall of that year, when Tchaikovsky fled to Italy in despair over the absurdity of his marriage, Kotek left Russia to study with Joseph Joachim in Berlin; the following March they caught up with each other at Clarens, Tchaikovsky's favorite Swiss retreat, and it was there, on the 17th of that month, that the composer began work on the Violin Concerto.
The first movement was completed in two weeks, the remainder on April 11, by which time the original slow movement had already been replaced by the exquisite Canzonetta. (The deleted Andante, under the title Méditation, subsequently became the first section of the three-part Souvenir d'un lieu cher for violin and piano, Op. 42.) Although Tchaikovsky felt Kotek had mastered the Concerto well enough to perform it, Kotek had reservations about his readiness, and it was only then that the work was offered to Auer. As it turned out, the Concerto was the only work of Tchaikovsky's to be introduced to the world by the illustrious Vienna Philharmonic; on the podium was one of the most respected conductors of his time, and the soloist was a violinist who believed in the new work without reservation. (Brodsky, in fact, had introduced Tchaikovsky's Sérénade mélancolique in Moscow six years earlier.) Even under those favorable conditions, this eminently lovable concerto touched off energetic protests on that occasion. The notorious Viennese critic Eduard Hanslick, who was actually not without admiration for Tchaikovsky, used in his review an expression usually translated as"music that stinks in the ear." That harsh judgment, however, was soon overwhelmingly repudiated, and one of the first to reject it was Auer, who, just as Nikolai Rubinstein had done, took up the work after all and became one of its great interpreters. He then enthusiastically taught the Concerto to two generations of Russian violinists who further solidified its place in the repertory.
Auer left Russia in 1918 to settle in the United States, and died in Germany two years later, aged 85. Brodsky, too, was active in our country for a short time, serving as concertmaster of Walter Damrosch's New York Symphony Orchestra from 1891 to 1894; he then moved to England, where he died 18 months after Auer. The now forgotten Kotek, who never performed the concerto written for him, died of consumption in Switzerland before reaching the age of 30; his last months were brightened by a visit from Tchaikovsky.
Throughout the Concerto, the writing for the orchestra is as imaginative as for the solo instrument, and the eloquent passages for the various woodwinds in particular (most notably the clarinet in the slow movement) tend to evoke a fairy-tale atmosphere much like that of the music for Swan Lake, which had its premiere only a year before the Concerto was composed. The theme of the final movement, which bears a certain resemblance to the corresponding section of Mendelssohn's similarly beloved Violin Concerto in E minor, also looks forward to the Russian Dance in the last of Tchaikovsky's ballets, The Nutcracker.