Violist Scott Slapin Explores Paganini's Caprices
Releases new CD, Paganini's 24 Caprices
William Primrose's selections from Paganini's 24 Caprices stand as a testament to how violists can summon beauty and technical virtuosity from notorious violin etudes. Violist Scott Slapin explores the caprices further for violistic depth in his latest CD, Paganini's 24 Caprices (Eroica Classical Recordings JDT3420).
With the album, Slapin etches his name into history as the violist to have recorded the full set of caprices after violist and artist Emanuel Vardi's groundbreaking 1965 recording for the Epic label. "As long as they've existed, they've been played on viola," says Slapin of the caprices, originally written for the violin. "I think there was almost the expectation by the composer that you would play this on the viola as well."
Liner notes to Slapin's album suggest this was the case since Paganini had acquired a 1731 Stradivari viola and had expressed the desire to concertize with it. "At our unique point in history, a lot of things have changed," Slapin says. "It seems odd to us to borrow from the violin literature. Over time, viola players have distanced themselves, but that doesn't negate the circumstances [in which these works had been written]."
Slapin, who is solely a violist, started working on the caprices 15 years ago. His arrangements were lost to Hurricane Katrina.
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