Word: pizzicato
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...were no bigger than a fiddle. In two programs he ranged from the Khachaturian cello concerto to a Bach suite to Debussy pieces. He played with uncanny accuracy and ease, demonstrated his power by the zing of his attacks, especially in the way he clouted his instrument in loud pizzicato chords. At quieter moments, he laid his cheek against the neck of the cello as if it were a pillow. Shafran's tone was big and creamy, his cantilena as expressive as if words were being sung. Critics raved. Said the Berliner Zeitung: "This artist must be counted among...
...Sonata for Violin and Piano was most successful in the fast outer movements. The first movement, in a modified sonata-form with a bit too much stop-and-go, adopted a Bartokian brutality and approach to dissonance; and the finale dared to end softly with an effective pizzicato and staccato section. Rzewski failed to realize, however, that the bottom range of the violin is easily covered up by too heavy a piano accompaniment. And his piano texture tended to fall into two extremes--simple parallel octaves, or thick massive chords--with little in between. The slow movement was much...
...Walter (The Incredible Flutist) Piston's Symphony No. 5, probably his best work to date. It began with something that sounded suspiciously like forest murmurs, complete with flute and pizzicato strings. But soon it built a blazing climax on a pyramid of harmonies, brass on winds on strings, in orchestration as solid as Tchaikovsky's. The first movement, indeed, was a rejuvenated Piston; in the other two, however, he reached his high points of lyricism without seeming to aim for them, leaving a feeling of puzzlement...
...human heartbeat of a situation, Rattigan might as well be hunting uranium with an ear trumpet. Moreover, in The Deep Blue Sea, the leading lady does little to help. The part is scored, though crudely, for the full cello notes of womanly anguish; Vivien plays it in the thin pizzicato of girlish petulance...
...late Chief Justice Vinson (Said Warren to a court official who asked him if he wanted his own specially built chair: "Pshaw, that one's plenty good enough for me!"). Occasionally he asked a quiet question to clarify a point. Associate Justice Felix Frankfurter, as if playing pizzicato violin to Warren's cello, turned and twisted in his specially built chair, fired quick, needling questions at the attorneys, sent messengers scurrying for law books. All of the nine men behind the long bench, unlikely to agree, knew that they faced a decision that could well be a landmark...