Eastern Motifs in Violin Literature

Abstract

Violin repertoires one of the brightestpages of music history. New playing techniques have been developed throughout the history of violin art, in addition to this, virtuoso violin works, which requirenew playing techniques, have emerged. These are violin sonatas, variations, concertos. These works are also dedicated to different motifs and themes. Among theexamples are A. Vivaldi’s Four Violin Concertos the four seasons, Paganini’s Prayer Variations from G. Rossini’s “Moses”, or the Violin Caprices about Hunting or War (No. 9, 14, 17) . In the violin literature, there are many works of world composers devoted to Eastern motifs. Since the Baroque period, composers began to apply these motifs. This tendency continued all the time and led to the formation of a wider repertoire. Great interest in Oriental music is growing from both European and Russian composers. Passion for the Orient W. A. Mozart’s “Die Entführung aus dem Serail”, C. Saint-Saens’ “Samson et Dalilah”, J. Bizet’s “Jamele”, N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Scheherazade”, Reinhold Glière’s “Shakh-Senem” and has been seen many other works. These motives considered asnot only in large genres, but also in works of small genres. In this context, romance, suite and other works for violin attract attention.
 In this study, it is aimed to examine the period and composer styles in popular works of the violin repertoire composed on Eastern motifs such as “Romanza Andaluza” by P. Sarasate, “Orientale” by C. Cui, “Baal Shem” by E. Bloch and “Tzigane” by M. Ravel. These works were examined in terms of harmonic structure.