Sonata for Violin and Piano (2nd edition)

Papandopulo composed the Sonata for Violin and Piano, as he wrote in his own hand on the title page of the autograph, in Tribunj on December 18, 1988, for pianist Ida Gamulin and violinist Goran Končar, to whom the work is dedicated. The first movement starts with a dramatic introduction by the piano, after which the solo violin brings in the expressive main theme, which consists of a sequence of highly profiled and impressive motif, motific units, that is, from which the composer would generate a large part of the movement’s facture. With his usual mastery, Papandopulo transformed, melodically varied and permuted the motifs. The second movement, Scherzo, is constructed in the very interesting and irregular 7/8 measure, which we would connect with the folk music of Macedonia or Bulgaria. The third movement, like so many other movements of Papandopulo’s concertante and chamber works, represent the composer’s deepest draught on the most mysterious regions of his own musical being. Papandopulo’s music is complex and acerbic in sound, but extremely rich in valuable and profoundly inspired musical ideas full of genuine poetry. We can find all these characteristics in the musical substance of the third movement. Melancholy, pensiveness, lyricism and concentrated expressive strength give the movement a unique and inexplicable metaphysical beauty. The theme of the fourth movement comes from the Bosnian folk song “A pine bough fell by the sea”. Because of the simplicity of the facture, based on vernacular music, the last movement is very different from the previous movements. But the greatest characteristic of the music is that it is deeply lived-through with a subtle emotionality, devoid of any pathos or externality. Put figuratively, Papandopulo’s music has an elementary power here: it enchants us with its primal beauty like crystal clear water from the spring of a mountain stream Because of the richness of invention, the interest of the harmonic solutions and the pregnancy of the musical thought, irrespective of the issue of its formal structural cohesion, interpreters and listeners are always glad to revisit this masterly composition.