Sofia Gubaidulina - Rejoice! sonata for violin and cello (1981) [Радуйся!] [Freue dich!]

Rejoice! sonata for violin and cello (1981) [Радуйся! (Raduysya!)] [Freue dich!]
Composer: Sofia Gubaidulina (b. 1931)
Performers: Quatuor Molinari: Olga Ranzenhofer & Frédéric Bednarz, violin; Frédéric Lambert, viola; Pierre-Alain Bouvrette, cello.

I - Your joy no man taketh from you: 0:00
II - Rejoice with them that do rejoice: 2:49
III - Rejoice, Rabbi: 7:28
IV - And he returned into his house: 17:05
V - Listen to the still small voice within: 22:46
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"The background to Sofia Gubaidulina's Rejoice!, as Laurel Fay's sleeve-note informs us, is in the spiritual lessons of Grigory Skovoroda, an eighteenth-century Ukrainian philosopher and religious thinker. These supply the sub-titles (rather Messiaen-like in resonance) of each of the five movements. The composer herself cautions, ''It should not be assumed that I wanted to illustrate the theme of joy in my music… the religious theme is experienced metaphorically''. It is meant to be experienced musically as well, through the juxtaposition of 'normal' sounds and harmonics: 'The possibility for string instruments to derive pitches of various heights at one and the same place on the string can be experienced in music as the transition to another plane of existence. And that is joy.' "

Source: https://www.gramophone.co.uk/review/shostakovich-string-quartet-15-gubaidulina-rejoice

"The title of the substantial sonata for violin and cello, Rejoice! (also known as
Raduysya! and Freue dich!), ought not be taken literally, the music less expression of
outward joy than metaphoric contemplation upon its stated theme. Composed in
1981 and premiered in 1988 by its dedicatees, Natalia Gutman and Oleg Kagan, at
Kuhmo in Finland, each of the work’s five movements takes its title from an aphorism
by the Ukrainian religious philosopher Hryhorii Skovoroda (1722-94) who embraced
the simple life and sympathized with the underprivileged.

'Your joy no one will take away from you' (I) opens with the solo violin meditating
upon a handful of high notes that alternate with harmonics. The cello then rises up
from its depths, eventually matching its partner with a harmonic of its own. The two
don mutes in 'Rejoice with joy' (II), whose chromatic, humming figures suggest a pair
of insects buzzing around one another. In 'Rejoice, Rabbi' (III), the solo cello’s grinding
low clusters, flailing tremolos, harmonic double stops and pizzicato chords establish
wild contrast in technique and mood as the movement’s organizing principle. A
frenzied violin cadenza collapses into a magical moment — perhaps the work’s heart —
in which ethereal double-stop harmonics sing like a distant choir of heavenly voices.
The ponderous 'And he returned to his own abode' (IV) traces a gradual descent from
the stratosphere of pitch where glacial tones in the violin combine with wind-like
whistling in cello harmonics. 'Heed thyself' (V) offers by far the most overtly joyful
music in the sonata, a rhythmically-precise, energetic figure in the violin playing out
over a drawn-out chant in the cello. Earthly joy in the form of giddiness thus makes
an appearance — but has not the last word: a coda steers us back into a world of introspection, the 'still small voice within' surely finding expression in the concluding soft
chord in harmonics."

~Robert Rival
Source: CD booklet
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