Timothy Judd

A native of Upstate New York, Timothy Judd has been a member of the Richmond Symphony violin section since 2001. He is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music where he earned the degrees Bachelor of Music and Master of Music, studying with world renowned Ukrainian-American violinist Oleh Krysa. The son of public school music educators, Timothy Judd began violin lessons at the age of four through Eastman’s Community Education Division. He was a student of Anastasia Jempelis, one of the earliest champions of the Suzuki method in the United States. A passionate teacher, Mr. Judd has maintained a private violin studio in the Richmond area since 2002 and has been active coaching chamber music and numerous youth orchestra sectionals. In his free time, Timothy Judd enjoys working out with Richmond’s popular SEAL Team Physical Training program.

Remembering Radu Lupu

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The great Romanian pianist, Radu Lupu, passed away earlier this week. According to his manager, Lupu “died peacefully in his home in Switzerland from numerous long-term illnesses.” He was 76 years old. In 1966, Radu Lupu was awarded the first prize at the second Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. He went on to win first prizes at the George Enescu International Piano Competition and the Leeds International Piano Competition. Lupu’s playing was filled …

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Handel’s Concerto Grosso, Op. 6, No. 11 in A Major: Bremer Barockorchester

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George Frideric Handel was one of music history’s most successful entrepreneurs. Handel’s 40-plus Italian operas brought the finest singers of the day to the London stage and earned the composer celebrity status. Yet, in 1738 when opera seria began to fall out of favor with English audiences, Handel transitioned seamlessly to a popular new genre, the dramatic oratorio. As an added attraction, he composed the twelve Concerti Grossi, Op. 6 to be performed between …

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Prokofiev’s First Piano Concerto: Enter the Enfant Terrible

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Piano Concerto No. 1 in D-flat Major, Op. 10 is music of the audacious, young Sergei Prokofiev. Completed in 1911 when the 22-year-old composer was still a student at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory, the Concerto’s brash, spirited energy elicited strong public reactions. The August 7, 1912 premiere in Moscow marked Prokofiev’s first appearance with an orchestra and showcased his dazzling keyboard virtuosity. In a letter, Prokofiev recalled that “the outward success was …

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Tallis’ “Lamentations of Jeremiah”: Holy Week in Renaissance England

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The English Renaissance composer Thomas Tallis wrote the Lamentations of Jeremiah in the 1560s for the liturgy of Maundy Thursday. At the time, musical settings from the Book of Jeremiah were common in England during the Christian Holy Week. The texts, which lament the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple by the Babylonians, held significance for Roman Catholics amid the turmoil surrounding the rise of Protestantism. The Lamentations were written during the early years of …

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Debussy’s “Bruyères” from Préludes, Book 2: Krystian Zimerman

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Composed between 1909 and 1913, Claude Debussy’s twenty four solo piano Préludes are divided into two books. Unlike the Preludes of Chopin or J.S. Bach’s The Well-Tempered Clavier, they do not form a sequential harmonic procession. Instead, they float ephemerally between traditional tonality and modal harmony, and the pentatonic and whole tone scales. They emerge as dreamy, atmospheric vignettes. Bruyères is the fifth Prélude from Book II. Translating as “heather,” it “evokes pastoral bliss, an Arcadian …

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Brahms’ Piano Trio No. 1 in B Major: From Youth to Maturity

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Johannes Brahms’ Piano Trio No. 1 in B Major, Op. 8 exists in two versions. The first was published in 1854, only months after the 21-year-old Brahms met Robert and Clara Schumann for the first time. Thirty-six years later, Brahms returned to the work during the summer of 1889 with the intention of trimming its “youthful excesses.” That September, he wrote to Clara Schumann, You cannot imagine how I trifled away the lovely …

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Elgar’s “Cockaigne” (“In London Town”): Portrait of a Dynamic City

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In 1777, the polymath Samuel Johnson wrote, famously, “When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford.” Sir Edward Elgar’s 1901 overture Cockaigne (In London Town), Op. 40, is a glittering portrait of this dynamic city on the Thames. In medieval mythology, Cockaigne represented an imaginary utopia filled with endless physical comforts, idleness, and pleasure. In the early years of the …

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