Clesh: Paganini caprice 16

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Paganini caprice 16
3 minutes, 39 seconds long
Published 29 December, 2009
Keywords: I think the 16th caprice gives us a vision of Paganini's unbalanced personality, at times you almost feel that he is close to insanity. [Music] And this is nothing new that a great artist is on the brink. The intensity of this caprice is almost impossible to maintain, you feel that the bow and the violin will just split from the stress, you feel that an audience will become too breathless from hearing it and you feel that you yourself, the violinist can hardly manage to play until the end, so fierce is the intensity. [Music] Because Paganini errs to velocity very very quick changes, from the lowest to the  highest notes, the bow must be used in a very vertical way but at ridiculously fast speeds and the fingers have to correspond of course to this great surging intense demand. [Music] The Tatler wrote that 'Paganini's violin is like a wild animal which he is endeavouring to quiet in his bosom and which he occasionally fiend-like lashes with his bow.' [Music] And Paganini spoke of 'The electricity I experience in producing my magical music and which does me infinite harm.'. He knew that he had this element, and that he could pick it up even when he felt very depressed and even physically weak. The music gave him that electricity, and after a concert though he shook from the violence of the experience. And the violence we can even see in the manuscript because it looks like the pen starts at the first note and doesn't stop until the very end. It goes on with an insane frenzy, as does the sound of this 16th caprice. [Music]
Jack Glatzer