Jascha Heifetz

Jascha Heifetz – Tchaikovsky: Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 35 by Jascha Heifetz (1957/2023)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 29:38 minutes | 529 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Alexandre Bak – Classical Music Reference Recording

The Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 35 was the only concerto for violin composed by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. Composed in 1878, it is one of the best-known violin concertos.

The concerto was composed in Clarens, Switzerland, where Tchaikovsky was recovering from the fallout of his ill-fated marriage. The concerto was influenced by Édouard Lalo’s Symphonie espagnole and was composed with the help of Tchaikovsky’s pupil and probable former lover, Iosif Kotek. Despite Tchaikovsky’s original intention to dedicate the work to Kotek, he instead dedicated it to Leopold Auer due to societal pressures. Auer, however, refused to perform it, and the premiere was given by Adolph Brodsky in 1881 to mixed reviews. The piece, which Tchaikovsky later rededicated to Brodsky, has since become a staple of the violin repertoire. The concerto has three movements, is scored for solo violin and orchestra, and typically runs for about 35 minutes.

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Jascha Heifetz – Brahms: Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 77 by Jascha Heifetz (2023)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 34:43 minutes | 608 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Alexandre Bak – Classical Music Reference Recording

Jascha Heifetz was a Russian-American violinist. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest violinists of all time. Born in Vilnius, he moved to the United States as a teenager, where his Carnegie Hall debut was rapturously received. He was a virtuoso from childhood. Fritz Kreisler, another leading violinist of the twentieth century, said after hearing Heifetz’s debut, “We might as well take our fiddles and break them across our knees.” He had a long and successful performing career; however, after an injury to his right (bowing) arm, he switched his focus to teaching.

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Jascha Heifetz – Wieniawski, Saint-Saëns, Vieuxtemps & Sarasate: Works for Violin and Orchestra (2020)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:08:43 minutes | 669 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Warner Classics

The insert-note here relates the remarkable story that Barbirolli, stepping off the boat-train at 11 o’clock one morning in 1935 after a visit abroad, was told that at 2 o’clock he was to record Vieuxtemps’s Concerto No. 4 a work he had never even heard, let alone seen with Heifetz. Using a score “so yellow with age that the pages crumbled” as they were turned, the work was nevertheless recorded in a single session a tribute not only to Barbirolli’s professionalism and skill but also to Heifetz’s confidence in the conductor (then aged 36, two years older than himself), having already recorded concertos by Glazunov and Mozart with him, as the most able of accompanists. On the face of it, as AS remarked when reviewing this collection on LP (10/87 nla), the combination may have seemed surprising, in view of the different temperaments of the two artists; but it certainly worked. There is a romantic fervour in the performance of this fourmovement concerto (which won Berlioz’s praise), and which is notable for the lyricism of its first two movements and the spectacular virtuosity of its one-in-a-bar Scherzo (the first sight of which alarmed Barbirolli, and no wonder) and of its finale, both of which Heifetz dispatches with consummate mastery.
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Jascha Heifetz – The Magic of Jascha Heifetz (2016)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 03:19:15 minutes | 1,98 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Masterworks

There is a broad consensus that Jascha Heifetz set a standard of violin playing that has yet to be surpassed. Fellow violinists have called him the High Priest of our profession (Carl Flesch), the greatest violinistic influence since Paganini (Ruggerio Ricci), The Emperor (Henryk Szeryng), the King of us all (Pinchas Zukerman), and God (Itzak Perlman). His playing continues to inspire new generations of musicians.

Taken from the 24-CD box set of his complete stereo recordings, The Magic of Jascha Heifetz Remastered (3-CD set) is a collection of highlights that emphasize Heifetz s virtuosity by bringing together a broad cross-section of his stereo recordings. All of the music has been remastered from the original analogue tapes to bring out their best sound. All of the performances in this highlights collection were recorded after 1956 the last year that Heifetz embarked on an extensive tour. Although they capture the playing of his twilight years, the inimitable Heifetz standard is evident throughout.
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Jascha Heifetz – Schubert: Quintet in C Major, D. 956 – Brahms: Sextet in G Major, Op. 36 (2016)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 01:08:15 minutes | 2,80 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © RCA Red Seal

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Jascha Heifetz – The Piano Trio Collection – Dvorák: Trio No. 3 in F Minor, Op. 65 & Trio No. 4 in E Minor, Op. 90 (2016)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 59:44 minutes | 2,30 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © RCA Red Seal

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Jascha Heifetz – Beethoven, Schubert, etc (2016)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 01:09:56 minutes | 2,73 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © RCA Red Seal

The triumphs of Jascha Heifetz are well known: first public performance in his hometown of Vilnius, Lithuania at the age of 5; Berlin Philharmonic debut at the age of 11; one of the most memorable debuts in the annals of Carnegie Hall at the age of 16; followed by tours, long before the ease of air travel, to the far reaches of the world: Japan, Australia, South America, India, the Middle East, and beyond—conquering audiences wherever he went. In all, he had a public career lasting some 65 years.

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Jascha Heifetz – Heifetz, Primrose and Piatigorksy: The String Trio Collection (2016)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 01:06:44 minutes | 2,77 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © RCA Red Seal

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