There is no Free Lunch

[Original Post at my Blog | My Blog]

Before its premiere, Tchaikovsky's violin concerto was deemed “unplayable” by Leopold Auer, a famous violinist and pedagog. To paraphrase his words, playing the concerto is like “beating the violin left and right, over and over again”. Ironically, it's Auer whom the concerto was dedicated to.

Brahm's violin concerto suffered a similar fate. Pablo de Sarasate, a virtuoso, refused to play it on the basis that “the only proper melody was by the oboe”. And that's basically saying that only 1/3 page, out of 20 pages of scores, is worth listening!

Rachmaninoff's 1st symphony fared better where it made its first premiere. But then began the not-so-fun story: it's criticised by César Cui as “a symphony based on the Seven Plagues of Egypt composed by a student of a conservatory in hell”.

And yet, the above mentioned are now widely accepted as acclaimed pieces of work.

Of course, it's not happened just by a snap of fingers. Lots of things happened: revisions, etc. The old adage “there ain't free lunch” aptly sums up the situation. In the case of Rachmaninoff, he paid by suffering a great depression for several years.