The Romantic Violin Concerto Vol.15

The latest volume of Hyperion's Romantic Violin Concerto series journeys to Poland for two concertos by Emil Mlynarski and two works for violin and orchestra by Aleksander Zarzycki. Mlynarski takes as his models the virtuoso works of Vieuxtemps and Wieniawski. His Violin Concerto No.1, dedicated to Leopold Auer, was written in 1897 and won a prize in the Paderewski Composition Competition. Like most Polish composers, Zarzycki also wrote pieces in the form of the krakowiak. The Introduction et Cracovienne was well liked by violinists in Zarzycki's own time but amazingly was not recorded until the CD era. The Mazurka on the other hand is the composer's best-known work and was recorded by Oistrakh, amongst others.