Gerald Finzi's Introit for Violin and Small Orchestra
Sharing one of my favourite pieces of music today. https://youtu.be/ohuMdhyopxU The English composer Gerald Finzi famously was never satisfied with his own work; he constantly revised pretty much everything he composed, and many pieces ended up being abandoned. This was the case with his Concerto for Violin and Small Orchestra, completed in 1927. Although Finzi got a lot of advice and help from his two main mentors and friends, Ralph Vaughan Williams and Gustav Holst, he was not happy at all with the first movement, so that got thrown out before the first performance of the second and third movements of the Concerto, which took place in May 1927. Holst felt that those movements, and even more particularly the second movement, were “the best things I know of yours.” After the first performance, however, Finzi decided that the third movement was just not good enough, and so that, too, was discarded. This second movement was subsequently published on its own as Introit for Violin and Sma