JAVS Spring 2020

Feature Article

No Romantic Viola Concerto? Think Again. The rocky history of Forsyth’s Viola Concerto Devan Maria Freebairn

In the viola world, three major concertos share the limelight: Bartók, Hindemith and Walton. If the list were expanded to include the top five, Hoffmeister and Stamitz may be added. Beyond five, many violists would pause. The viola fully emerged as a solo instrument in the twentieth century, so the fact that there are fewer concertos for viola than for violin or cello is not surprising. The viola may lack the depth and diversity of soloist repertoire when compared to the violin or cello, but it is not without its own, albeit smaller, body of solo works. There are more concertos in the viola repertoire than many violists know. One of these lesser-known concertos is Cecil Forsyth’s Viola Concerto in G minor, composed in 1903. This work should be recognized as one of the major viola concertos in the repertoire. The Forsyth Viola Concerto (and the man it was written for) influenced the emergence of the viola as a solo instrument in the twentieth century. Although written after the turn of the century, its Romantic musical style can be understood by comparing it to analogous works for other string instruments, like Dvořák’s Violin Concerto and Elgar’s Cello Concerto. While it faded in popularity because of a lack of promotion and a slight by Lionel Tertis, it holds up in competitions against other grand concerti and it teaches skills pertinent to playing other standard viola repertoire.

viola, beginning their careers on the violin. But just as Tertis paved the way for Primrose, there were players that paved the way for Tertis. In his memoir, My Viola and I, Tertis mentions the difficulty of learning to play the viola without the help of his teacher: Thenceforward I worked hard and, being dissatisfied with my teacher—who knew nothing about the idiosyncrasies of the viola nor indeed was there any pedagogue worthy of its name to go for guidance—I resolved to continue my study by myself. I consider that I learnt to play principally through listening to virtuosi; I lost no opportunity of attending concerts to hear great artists perform. I especially remember hearing Sarasate at the old St. Jame’s [ sic ] hall playing the Mendelssohn concert most marvelously—every note a pearl. 2 While Tertis may not have deemed anyone worthy of teaching him the viola, there were good violists around him. During the time Tertis was learning to play the viola, he was also a second violinist in the Queen’s Hall Orchestra, beginning in 1898. 3 The principal viola player in the Queen’s Hall Orchestra at the time was Belgian violist Émile Férir. Férir studied both violin and viola at the Brussels Conservatory. His violin teacher was renowned pedagogue Eugène Ysaÿe 4 and his viola professor was Léon Firket, the first professor to teach a course specifically for viola in all of Europe. 5 Férir later studied at the Paris Conservatory, graduating with a premier prix . After Paris, he joined the Queen’s Hall Orchestra as principal, a position he held from 1896 through 1902. At that point, he was invited to Boston to be the principal violist of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Tertis took over as principal violist at Queen’s Hall. 6 It stands to reason that Tertis and Férir

An Overlooked Contributor to the Emergence of the Viola as a Solo Instrument

Lionel Tertis (1876–1975) and William Primrose (1904– 1982) are the two men who are praised for elevating the viola as a solo instrument. 1 Both Tertis and Primrose were virtuosic players who proved that anything one could play on the violin could also be played on the viola. They wrote many transcriptions and had many pieces written for them. Tertis and Primrose were both converts to the

Journal of the American Viola Society / Vol. 36, No. 1, Spring 2020

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