Tzigane

Tzigane was written in 1924 for Jelly d'Arányi, the Hungarian violinist and great-niece of Joseph Joachim, after Ravel had heard her improvise gypsy tunes late into the night at a London party. He gave her the piece only days before the first performance, in London on 26 April 1924, with Henri Gil-Marchex at a luthéal — a piano fitted with a mechanism producing a cimbalom-like rattle. The orchestral version followed later that year. Nearly half the work is an unaccompanied violin monologue before the orchestra enters at all.