Kaddisch Cover Image

Kaddisch: Violin Solo with Piano

$4.99 USD
$4.99 USD
Skip to product information
Kaddisch Cover Image
Kaddisch: Violin Solo with Piano

Kaddisch: Violin Solo with Piano

for Violin and Piano

By Maurice Ravel, ed./arr. Lucien Garban

Item: 36-60710004
$4.99
Shipped

One moment…

Description
Maurice Ravel (1875-1937) originally wrote Deux Mélodies Hébraïques (Two Hebrew Songs) for voice and piano for soprano Alvina Alvi, who premiered the two songs in June of 1914. While both songs include French text, the first and more popular song, Kaddisch (Holy), is also in Aramaic, while the second song, L'énigme éternelle (The Eternal Riddle), is in Yiddish. Ravel orchestrated both for voice and orchestra in 1920, and many other transcriptions, particularly of Kaddisch, have followed over the years. This transcription by the French composer and arranger Lucien Garban put Kaddisch into the violin repertoire, where it finds regular performance.

Kaddisch: Violin Solo with Piano isn't in MakeMusic Cloud just yet...but it could be. Let us know you'd like to see it, and you'll help shape what comes next. In the meantime, start a free trial and dive into thousands of interactive titles your students can play along with today.

Request This Title

Tell us you want it.

Start Your Free Trial

Explore everything that's ready to play right now.
Sample Pages

No sample pages found.
Sample Audio
No sample audio found.
Sample Video
No sample videos found.
Additional Details
Series: Master String Series - LudwigMasters
Publisher: Keiser Productions, Inc.
ISBN10: 8-88-852194-1
ISBN13: 979-8-88-852194-6
UPC: 676737774257
SKU: 36-60710004
Instrumentation: Violin and Piano

More about this title

About the Composer: Maurice Ravel

Maurice Ravel (1875-1937) was a French composer whose harmonic innovations and orchestral brilliance shaped early twentieth-century music. His work balanced impressionistic color with classical form, and he brought the same meticulous craftsmanship to both large orchestral works and intimate vocal music. Ravel's Deux Mélodies Hébraïques emerged from a deep interest in world music and Jewish liturgical tradition, composed for a specific soprano and later expanded through orchestration and arrangement into new performance contexts.

Why we love this

This arrangement brings one of the twentieth century's most compelling vocal melodies into violin repertoire without sacrificing its haunting expressivity or spiritual weight. Kaddisch demands both technical control and emotional restraint from the soloist, making it rewarding at upper-intermediate to advanced levels. The piece carries genuine historical significance as a work written across multiple genres by a major composer, yet it remains accessible enough that dedicated students can tackle it meaningfully.

What to expect

Kaddisch unfolds with meditative stillness, its melody moving through modal harmony with an almost liturgical quality. The music conveys reverence without grandeur, creating an intimate spiritual atmosphere even as harmonic shifts create moments of harmonic tension and searching.

Who it's for

Advanced high school violinists and undergraduate string students ready to engage with twentieth-century harmonic language and expressive subtlety. Violinists drawn to art song arrangements and liturgical or spiritual repertoire will find genuine artistic depth in this piece.

How to get the most out of it

  • Shape the opening phrase with subtle dynamic gradation rather than sudden changes; Ravel's harmony supports a long, singing line that breathes naturally across the first eight bars.
  • Balance vibrato carefully in the middle and upper register. The piece requires sustained expression, but excessive vibrato can obscure the modal and harmonic colors Ravel composed.
  • Listen closely to the piano part during rehearsal. The accompaniment contains thematic material and harmonic detail that guide phrasing and intonation across key modulations.
  • Approach the return to the opening material as a restatement with deeper resonance rather than exact repetition. The second occurrence carries cumulative weight from what has come before.

How to use it

Program this as a recital centerpiece for a student ready to showcase musical maturity and emotional intelligence. It pairs well with other early twentieth-century transcriptions or art song arrangements, or it can anchor a concert segment exploring Jewish musical traditions across genres and centuries.

Skills your students will build

  • Reading accidentals and harmonic analysis in twentieth-century modal and chromatic language
  • Sustaining expression through extended melodic phrases with minimal vibrato variation
  • Coordinating intonation with a complex piano part that contains modal and chromatic inflections
  • Phrasing transcribed vocal music on an instrumental instrument while respecting text-derived contours

You May Also Like