Well, unless they’re playing the last movement of Bruch’s first violin concerto. A popular refrain among violinists is that its difficulty is almost excessively demanding and awkward - but still, it remains an audience favourite.

It was dedicated to the violinist Joseph Joachim, who ranked it alongside Beethoven’s as the most serious in all the violin repertoire. The master of the romantic melody, Brahms really extended himself with his only violin concerto. Fast-forward a couple of centuries, and it’s one of the most performed concertos in the violin repertoire. Yet somehow, when it was written, it was considered a bit of a flop. He wrote brilliantly for the instrument elsewhere, but the violin concerto sees him employing his most characterful melodies and some daring compositional experiments.

It’s the only violin concerto he wrote, and Beethoven made sure it was a good one. Those who attempt it, and almost everyone does eventually, must contend not only with the notes themselves, but with the reputation those notes have in music history. The most famous of Beethoven’s piano concertos and perhaps of all his concertos in general, the Emperor, like its title suggests, towers above the piano repertoire. And though quite a few composers have used this format too, Bartok’s has rightly risen to the top - there’s nothing quite like it.īeethoven - Piano Concerto No.

It’s like a utopian, mega-inclusive vision of what a concerto can be. Turning the very idea of a concerto inside out, Bartok’s Concerto for Orchestra serves as a tour of the whole ensemble that highlights several instruments in turn. But of course, the real challenge was in the performance, the character, the magic of Barber’s musical language. In fact, during the composition of the concerto, the intended soloist Iso Briselli was worried that it wasn’t technically challenging enough. Like the other great American concerto from this time, Copland’s for the clarinet, Barber’s knack in his only violin concerto was to take a chance on the instrument’s character.

Guitar concerto in d