Marga Richter, Aria and Toccata for Viola and String Orchestra, Walter

Marga Richter composed the Aria & Toccata for Viola and String Orchestra for Walter Trampler at the request of M-G-M Records in the fall months of 1956. The work exists in an alternate version for viola and piano and it is in this form that it has been played most widely by Mr. Trampler since its successful recital introduction at the Library of Congress in Washington shortly after its completion. The profile of the music is completely representative of Miss Richter compositional style as those who have become familiar with the recordings of her Sonata for Piano, her Lament for Strings and her Concerto for Piano, Violas Cellos and Basses will note immediately. The composers vocabulary bears certain characteristic ear-marks: long-lined melody, and extraordinary sense of developmental architectronics, complexly dissonant harmony, austere yet somehow super-charged emotionality. The Aria and Toccata makes great demands upon the technique of the soloist and the writing for strings is firm and impressively