FLASHBACK FRIDAY | Elmar Oliveira Performs Shostakovich's Violin Concerto No. 1 in A Minor

This performance by the American violinist, with the Seattle Symphony Orchestra and Gerard Schwarz, was released on Artek Records in 2000

“This was my first time playing this difficult concerto and there was an excitement for a new work, much like I still experience today,” Oliveria told The Violin Channel. “It was like skydiving out of a plane. It was exhilarating.”

He feels that after all this time, how he interacts artistically with a piece is something that has changed him as a person and as a performer.

“Over the decades I have learned so much,” he told us. “One of the most valuable lessons I have learned is how to play more effortlessly. Being able to play in this way has dramatically changed the way I play the Shostakovich and others.”

If he could go back to this performance, he would advise himself to “savor every moment of this experience and know that how you play this today will be vastly different than how you will perform it in the future. It will be a glorious journey, so enjoy it.”

Oliveira is a former first prize winner at the Tchaikovsky and Naumburg International Violin Competitions — whose teachers included Ariana Bronne and Raphael Bronstein.

He is currently Artist-in-Residence at the Lynn University Conservatory of Music and serves on the jury of several prominent international violin competitions.

ELMAR OLIVEIRA | SHOSTAKOVICH | VIOLIN CONCERTO NO. 1 IN A MINOR, OP. 77 | 1ST MVT | GERARD SCHWARZ & SEATTLE SYMPHONY | 2000

ELMAR OLIVEIRA | SHOSTAKOVICH | VIOLIN CONCERTO NO. 1 IN A MINOR, OP. 77 | 2ND MVT | GERARD SCHWARZ & SEATTLE SYMPHONY | 2000

ELMAR OLIVEIRA | SHOSTAKOVICH | VIOLIN CONCERTO NO. 1 IN A MINOR, OP. 77 | 3RD MVT | GERARD SCHWARZ & SEATTLE SYMPHONY | 2000

ELMAR OLIVEIRA | SHOSTAKOVICH | VIOLIN CONCERTO NO. 1 IN A MINOR, OP. 77 | 4TH MVT | GERARD SCHWARZ & SEATTLE SYMPHONY | 2000