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David Matthews (b.1943) Winter Remembered concertino for viola and strings, op.86 In 1982

I wrote a solo violin piece, Winter Journey, based on Schubert's Winterreise, which I later arranged for solo viola. This version was premiered by Sarah-Jane Bradley in February 2000. Her insightful playing of that piece was very much in my mind when I came to write this present concertino - which is dedicated to her, and which also, in its second theme, makes an explicit reference to the first song of Schubert's song cycle. The title Winter Remembered is from a poem by the American poet John Crowe Ransom and of course makes a nice allusion to Winterreise as well as being not too far distant in its subject matter from the Wilhelm Müller poems that Schubert set. Winter Remembered is a single movement lasting just under fifteen minutes and is a combination of sonata and variation form. The latter is evident in the sectional construction of the piece, which has a slow central section, a cadenza and, after passing through many different moods, a tranquil coda. Winter Remembered was jointly commissioned by the Deal and Presteigne Festivals with funds provided by South East Arts.

© David Matthews