Beschreibung
Sonata for cello and piano was written in 1977 (completed on June 25) and dedicated to my father, the famous Lithuanian cellist and pedagogue Michailas Šenderovas, the first teacher of David Geringas at the Vilnius M. K. Ciurlionis Music School (from 1952 until 1958). That same year 1977 we performed the Sonata during a celebratory evening for his 60th birthday in the Lithuanian Philharmonic‘s Chamber Hall.
The dedication of the Sonata to my father determined this work‘s stylistics, theme and form. My father was a representative of the romantic performance school, he attained an excellent education at the Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) Conservatory where he was a student of the renowned professor Alexander Strimmer. The professor paid special attention to the cello‘s sound, its resonance,
emotionality, dynamic contrasts, rubato. Later my father continued his studies with Prof. Alexander Vlasov (author of the well known Melody), who fostered similar aspirations in his work.
In writing this Sonata, always on my mind was giving the performer the potential to reveal the cello‘s wonderful sound, to allow them to feel at ease in their interpretation of the piece as a whole, although of course this was not the only purpose of this work. The Sonata is mono-thematic, consisting of five contrasting parts, performed without any interval (attacca). This is music of a romantic character, even though today I notice it contains elements which have become typical of my later creative expression.
Anatolijus Šenderovas
2014
