RECORDINGS

HOMAGE TO BACH BACH

Solo Violin Sonatas: in G minor BWV1001, A minor BWV1003, and C major BWV1005

Brodsky Quartet

CHANDOS CHAN20162

Seamless cohesion in commendable Bach arrangements

Brodsky Quartet violist Paul Cassidy here extends his adept arranging skills to his ‘bible’, using techniques such as registral change, textural contrast and varied instrumentation of some repeated sections to reveal these sonatas in fresh guise. Chandos’s church recordings are very reverberant and their close miking picks up the ensemble’s sniffing and adversely affects its perceived dynamic range (notably in BWV1003’s final Allegro); nevertheless, the Brodskys take pains to whisper much of BWV1003’s Andante and demonstrate commendable cohesion, balance and blend throughout.

They pass phrases and thematic fragments seamlessly from one to the other, particularly in BWV1001’s Presto, and their accounts of the fugues are models of structural reflection, in which voice leading is clearly delineated. Pizzicato adds lightness to some episodes and underpins the opening of BWV1003’s Andante and BWV1005’s Largo, most pedal points are dramatically ramped up, and violist and cellist combine into a veritable rhythm section in BWV1005’s finale.

Tempos are generally apt, but the opening adagios of BWV1001 and 1003 feel too measured, despite Gina McCormack’s occasional quasi-improvisatory forays, and the Presto of BWV1001 seems too steady. However, despite the new perspective offered, these accounts will always be more of a supplement than a staple of listeners’ Bach diet.

ROBIN STOWELL

AMERICAN QUINTETS

BEACH Piano Quintet op.67 PRICE Piano Quintet in A minor BARBER Dover Beach Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective, Matthew Rose (bass) CHANDOS CHAN 20224

Outstanding collection of lesser-known chamber works from talented ensemble

This outstanding debut album by Wigmore Hall associate ensemble the Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective brings together an exceptional array of talent, including violinists Elena Urioste (alongside regular playing partner, pianist Tom Poster) and Melissa White, violist Rosalind Ventris and cellist Laura van der Heijden. They immediately arrest the attention by starting Amy Beach’s op.67 Piano Quintet senza vibrato and, as the main Allegro moderato gets under way, pace the mounting sense of emotional intensity to perfection. In the wrong hands, Beach’s unmistakably Brahmsian creative trajectory can create a mild sense of stylistic déjà vu, but played like this, sensitively nurtured with a sonic profile like crushed velvet (captured in alluringly opulent sound by Jonathan Cooper and Patrick Friend), she emerges as a ravishingly inspired master in her own right.

Rediscovered in an Illinois attic in 2009 and first published in 2017, Florence Price’s A minor Piano Quintet is inscribed ‘1952’, although on stylistic grounds it is more likely to date from the mid-1930s. Brahms is once again the principal stylistic springboard, yet listeners are propelled along by Price’s deeply personal rhythmic and melodic inflections, derived from spirituals, hymns and plantation songs (late Dvořák is brought to mind on several occasions), and unexpected moments of expressive rhetoric, such as the opening movement’s violin recitativos.

To browse through more than a decade of The Strad ’s recording reviews, visit www.thestrad.com/reviews

LAWRENCE SUMULONG

HOPE AMID TEARS BEETHOVEN Cello Sonatas Yo-Yo Ma (cello) Emanuel Ax (piano) SONY 19439883732

A sense of quiet magnificence radiates from two master musicians

The title may take on particular overtones in the current pandemic but it stems from Beethoven’s apparent inscription, ‘Amid tears and sorrow’, on the dedication copy of his op.69 Cello Sonata, a work whose positive outlook belied the composer’s inner turmoil at a time when his deafness was complete and Napoleon was invading Austria.

There’s a similar duality in Ma’s and Ax’s performances, which exude natural (often magical) warmth and eloquence, shunning surface effects while being underpinned by a super-attentiveness to details of tonal colour, phrasing, touch and transparency. There’s a quiet magnificence in the room, and it stems from the vast individual experience of these two musicians, continuing a collaboration of over 40 years driven by hunger and curiosity. Ax’s own particular long-standing association with Beethoven shines through at every turn and the recording quality is excellent.

Some may feel a lack of bite and edge here and there, but the poetic element is sublime, as in the Adagio of the First Sonata op.5 no.1, almost breathed rather than sounded; or the entrancing lyricism of the Adagio introduction of op.69’s third movement.

The variations are imbued with the same passion and grace as the sonatas, ending appropriately with the last set (on ‘Ein Mädchen oder Weibchen’ from The Magic Flute), which opens up the widest range of treatments and expression.

EDWARD BHESANIA

BEETHOVEN String Quartet op.130; Grosse Fuge op.133 Ehnes Quartet ONYX 4199

Beautifully balanced performances that wear the music’s intensity lightly

Beethoven punctuated his late scores with a spectrum of accents, calibrated as if in inverse proportion to his terrible handwriting, and admirably the Ehnes Quartet don’t add any more of their own in this lucid and free-flowing account of op.130, so that the first movement’s contrasts of hymn, fugue and dance follow on without anachronistic disruption.

Just as their portamento melts slower phrases from shards of ice into spring water, so the warmth and fullness of their tone in the following Presto offset its nervous energy.

Anyone previously put off op.130 by its unapproachable reputation or some celebrated recordings might listen to the Poco scherzoso or Alla danza tedesca and wonder what all the fuss is about: this is beautifully scaled, affectionate and neatly turned late-Classical chamber music playing which meets the listener more than halfway, yet without shortening Beethoven’s expressive horizons.

Listeners on CD may wish to switch the track order: following on the heels of the Cavatina’s assuaging cantabile in this performance, Beethoven’s replacement finale feels more than ever inadequate to the task of full closure – whereas the Grosse Fuge, presented as an appendix, sustains the momentum of its athletically articulated exposition right through to the adrenaline-fuelled coda, brought off with tremendous flourish rather than through gritted teeth. It’s not often that op.130 turns such a positive face to the world: hats off to James Ehnes and all of his magnificent colleagues.

PETER QUANTRILL

CANTO INTERNO BOTTESINI Introduction and Variations on Carnival of Venice KOUSSEVITZKY Four Pieces for double bass and piano SCHUMANN Fantasiestücke op.73 FRANCK Violin Sonata Luis Cabrera (double bass) Sylvia Huang (violin) Justyna Maj (piano) TRPTK TTK 0072

Double bass takes centre stage in delightful solo album

Once upon a time the double bass was viewed as little more than an instrument to provide an extension to orchestral string bass-lines. Things have changed dramatically in recent years, as can be judged by the quality of Netherlands Philharmonic principal bassist Luis Cabrera’s highly accomplished playing on this, his debut disc as a soloist. In his introductory notes Cabrera describes the album’s title as encapsulating ‘the space where we can hear and feel music in its purest state’, and few would argue after experiencing his effortless virtuosity and spotless intonation in this wide-ranging bass recital.

Whether in virtuoso showstoppers by Giovanni Bottesini (including the Gran Duo Concertante in the version for bass and violin with Sylvia Huang on dazzling form), Serge Koussevitzky’s sublime early miniatures, Robert Schumann’s poetically infused op.73 Fantasiestücke or César Franck’s sensually voluptuous Violin Sonata, Cabrera (playing an instrument by Carlo Ferdinando Landolfi) emerges musically and technically completely unscathed.

The latter pieces feature fully fleshed-out piano parts, played here with infectious abandonment and gusto by Justyna Maj, which might potentially overbalance the relatively discreet voice of the double bass. It is to Cabrera’s credit (as well as that of the sound team, Brendon Heinst and Ben van Leliveld) that he elects to segue in and out of the piano textures rather than attempt to dominate the proceedings by artificial spotlighting. Those used to a heavily projected top line in this music might miss the usual sense of sonic one-upmanship, yet played like this the music’s poetic intensity becomes, if anything, unexpectedly enhanced.

JULIAN HAYLOCK

1942 COPLAND Violin Sonata POULENC Violin Sonata PROKOFIEV Violin Sonata no.2 in D major op.94a Benjamin Baker (violin) Daniel Lebhardt (piano) DELPHIAN DCD34247

Thoughtfully programmed 20th-century sonatas from New Zealand violinist

These three sonatas and I have one thing in common: we were all begun in 1942. The Copland and Prokofiev were written in the interstices of film studio work. The open-air themes of Copland’s Andante semplice, as redolent of the American prairies as Vaughan Williams’s Lark Ascending is of pastoral England, sound just right with Benjamin Baker’s bright sonority. In the Lento he traces a fine line against Daniel Lebhardt’s thoughtful piano. The finale, more jagged at first, settles down to a tuneful dance, then violin recitatives against a dancing piano and a quiet close.

Poulenc was more at home with winds than strings and early records of this collage-like sonata – conceived as a memorial for Lorca and in its final version also mourning its first performer Ginette Neveu – were unconvincing. These artists seem in accord with its various moods and quotations. The Intermezzo’s nostalgic tinge is well captured.

The finale starts fast, almost like Prokofiev, but turns tragic at the end – quite frightening.

The real Prokofiev is a flute sonata fiddlified for Oistrakh. In this unusual context the performance works well, slower movements nicely played, faster ones displaying good rhythm and ensemble.

The recordings allow some E-string edge into Baker’s tone but are otherwise fine.

TULLY POTTER

HALLGRÍMSSON Klee Sketches, Books 1 and 2; Offerto Peter Sheppard Skærved (violin) MÉTIER MSV 28616

Seriously playful collection of musical sketches by Icelandic composer

Violinist Peter Sheppard Skærved first asked Icelandic-born, long-time Scottish resident composer Hafliði Hallgrímsson for a few short pieces for solo violin in 2005, for a concert he was about to give in a Mexico City art gallery. Hallgrímsson duly obliged, returning to the pieces several years later and adding a second book. The results are his two volumes of Klee Sketches, brief, tongue-in-cheek, quirky miniatures that seem to capture the homespun, unconventional imagery of the Swiss-born artist (himself a violinist), and which undoubtedly find an ideal interpreter in Sheppard Skærved.

There’s a certain raw directness about some of his playing – in the opening ‘Klee practising an accompaniment for a popular song’, for example – that gives his accounts a rewarding authenticity, and a sense of vivid, unhurried storytelling, too, for instance in the Ligeti-like workout of ‘Klee experimenting with a new scale’ or the remarkable range of colours he uncovers in ‘Do not neglect your pizzicato Herr Klee’.

There’s a lot of humour here, and unconventional musical demands that send Sheppard Skærved scurrying into all manner of extended effects, but these are deeply considered musical utterances too – none more so than the gently glowing lullaby of ‘Frau Klee is sleeping’, in two related versions.

Far more serious-minded, however, is the Offerto, almost a four-movement sonata written in memory of Icelandic visual artist Karl Kvaran, whose broader structures Sheppard Skærved approaches with a similar sense of spaciousness and narrative drive. It’s a seriously playful disc, conveyed in considered, committed performances, and captured in close, generous sound.

DAVID KETTLE

KODÁLY Duo for violin and violoncello op.7 DVOŘÁK Piano Trio no.4 ‘Dumky’ op.90 Barnabás Kelemen (violin) Nicolas Altstaedt (cello) Alexander Lonquich (piano) ALPHA CLASSICS 737

Spectacularly expressive performances of composers’ dazzling sound worlds

From the searingly intense opening to the Kodály Duo you are plunged headlong into a dazzling sound word, by turns exquisitely soft and then ragingly loud and powerful.

Supported by an outstandingly vivid recording derived from the 2021 Lockenhaus Festival, these artists deliver a rollercoaster performance, yet their conception of nuance is infinitesimally subtle. The Kodály teems with ‘micro-rubato’ gestures, the smallest tempo fluctuation yielding phrases that here sound spontaneous and almost improvised. Both performers not only empathise with the traditional folk roots in this music, but also master the numerous tempo changes within each movement with compelling control of the musical narrative and phenomenal ensemble.

The ‘Dumky’ Trio is equally mesmerising, with Alexander Lonquich’s piano timbre bursting with colour and astonishing timbral variety. As in the Kodály the almost constant tempo changes in each movement are projected with great assurance and consummate phrasing so artfully expressive yet eschewing any hint of mannerism.

An added bonus is the performance of a sketch for the third of the ‘Dumky’ Trio movements. The experience of hearing this version, which mixes material that is familiar in the final version with completely different ideas that Dvořák ultimately rejected, is a bit like seeing a familiar friend momentarily through a mist, particularly as the music stops exactly where the sketch does without resolution. This is a spectacular release in every regard.

JOANNE TALBOT

LABOR Violin Sonata no.1 op.5; Cello Sonata no.1 op.7; Theme and Variations op.10¹ Nina Karmon (violin) Floris Mijnders (cello) Přemysl Vojta (horn)¹ Oliver Triendl (piano) CAPRICCIO C5430

Labor shakes off the Brahmsian dust in late Romantic rarities

Beyond perhaps his words of praise for the young and self-taught Schoenberg, and his patient tuition of the teenage Alma Schindler, what did any of us know about Josef Labor (1842–1924)? Listened to blind – not an option for Labor, sightless from the age of three – the easy-going melody to launch his A major Cello Sonata of 1895 should transport most listeners to fin-de-siècle Vienna, and to the professional-standard amateur salons where everyone from bank clerks to princes made their fun.

If this isn’t grateful music to play, Floris Mijnders makes it seem so, enjoying without indulging the C-string communing of the brief Quasi andante (placed third after an elfin, Mendelssohnian scherzo) and skipping through the finale’s whirl of semiquavers, where he is sensitively partnered and balanced with Oliver Triendl’s piano.

Nina Karmon is more reticent – or placed further back – in the D minor Violin Sonata (1891) and I can imagine a more passionately yielding and soaring account of the Adagio (placed second this time) which finds Labor at his most Brahmsian. The imitation is so accomplished, the stylistic emulation achieved with so light a hand, that questions of originality seem beside the point, as they do in the achingly nostalgic horn writing of the (original) Theme and Variations. Anyone already familiar with this ensemble’s recent album of the more imposing Piano Quartet and Quintet will snap this up. Everyone else, and in particular seekers of late Romantic rarities, has a treat in store.

PETER QUANTRILL

MENDELSSOHN String quartets op.44: nos.1 & 2 Minguet Quartet CPO 555 086-2

Composer’s youthful works receive precise and unmannered performances

The Minguets have spun out their Mendelssohn cycle from three albums to four by expediently including the teenage unnumbered E flat major Quartet and the op.81 Pieces on the first volume, along with a scrupulously articulated and unmannered account of op.80 that gave notice of the virtues to be enjoyed on this latest instalment.

With op.44 no.1 in D major we join Mendelssohn on honeymoon, more relaxed in his compositional skin than either his ostentatiously effortless teenage emulations of Mozart and Beethoven, or his neurotically driven late masterpieces. The church acoustic places the Minguets at a little distance: good for the soft glow of the Minuet, the neoclassical nostalgia of the Andante and the finale’s quasi-orchestral brilliance, less helpful for the closely worked argument of the first movements in both quartets.

There is more detail to the tugging syncopations in the Henschel Quartet’s version of the E minor Quartet op.44 no.2, and greater expressive breadth to the Eroica Quartet’s beautifully nuanced recording. All the same, I warm to the Minguet’s close-woven, eventextured and pulse-led account, which respects what we understand of Mendelssohn’s attitudes to his Classical forebears and by extension to the principles underlying his own music, in which passions may run all the deeper when contained within a formal framework. He was a stickler for intonation, and the Minguets wisely prize absolute precision over headlong momentum in the chatter of the Scherzo. Too cool for some, perhaps, but this is Mendelssohn to reckon with.

PETER QUANTRILL

MOZART String Quartets Vol.1: ‘Prussian’ Quartets in D major KV575, B flat major KV589, F major KV590 Doric Quartet CHANDOS 20249(2) (2CDS)

Shaped, free approach makes a happy journey through Prussian territory

The opening Allegretto of Mozart’s D major Quartet sets the template for all the playing on these discs, warm and gemütlich, rhythmically tight and flowing. The genial passing of melody in the Andante is a delight, simply but subtly shaped. The Menuetto kicks into vigorous life, the sudden changes of dynamic done with dramatic intensity, and the beautifully paced finale shifts easily from sunny musing to energetic rhetoric.

They start the B flat major Quartet almost as if feeling their way, before landing with satisfying firmness on the first forte of the work and setting off with compelling ardour. They make much of the contrasts between light and shade (the F minor opening of the development is a fierce blast).

Cellist John Myerscough is eloquent in the solos Mozart provided for King Friedrich Wilhelm II of Prussia, the amateur cellist who commissioned this set, and does him proud once more with the melody which opens the Larghetto. Leader Alex Redington treats his semiquaver passage later in the movement with eloquent rhythmic freedom, which is apparent again as the trio of the third movement threatens to go exploring in remote keys, and in the finale when the headlong triplets give way to quiet uncertainty.

Strong contrasts, of character as well as dynamic, are a feature of the F major Quartet as well, as where the soft, curious snatches of dialogue at the start of the first-movement development are swept away by the bright and forceful imitative passage which follows. There is airy conviviality in the Andante and humour in the Menuetto. The semiquaver runs of the finale seem to slither along before the outbreaks of brilliant drama. The recorded sound is warm and clear.

TIM HOMFRAY

MOZART Violin Concerto no.5 in A major K219; Sinfonia concertante in E flat major K364 Mikhail Pochekin (violin) Ivan Pochekin (viola) Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra HÄNSSLER CLASSIC HC20078

Refreshing and spontaneous approach by brothers on the same wavelength

Having followed parallel paths since their childhood – they both studied with, among others, Rainer Schmidt and Viktor Tretiakov – the Russian brothers Mikhail and Ivan Pochekin now find themselves on exactly the same musical wavelength both technically and interpretatively.

Their reading of Mozart’s Sinfonia concertante exudes a delicious spontaneity, the two players consistently striking sparks off

each other. They take some liberties with the printed text that can come across as either refreshing or irritating according to one’s attitude towards urtext matters: slur patterns are occasionally modified, and the odd unscripted trill or frill added. Mozart is known to have spontaneously embellished his own music, so I’m not complaining!

Mikhail Pochekin contributes a somewhat mannered reading of the A major Concerto. He allows himself a few ungainly bulges in sustained notes, and his fussy phrasing in the Adagio fails to convince. On the other hand, his choice of some stylish cadenzas by the experienced Mozartian scholar, Robert Levin – once championed by Gidon Kremer – is an inspired alternative to the usual ones by Joseph Joachim. The recording was made in the generous acoustic of the Ludwigsburg Musikhalle, which – together with a balance that places the soloists decidedly upfront – masks some orchestral detail. However, the enthusiastic support of the conductorless Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra comes across emphatically.

CARLOS MARÍA SOLARE

MOZART Violin Sonatas Vol.3: no.25 in F major K377, no.27 in G major K379, no.19 in E flat major K302, no.32 in B flat major K454 Isabelle Faust (violin) Alexander Melnikov (fortepiano) HARMONIA MUNDI HMM 902362

Musicians having the time of their lives in insightful interpretations

Throughout this captivating recital, Isabelle Faust’s ‘Sleeping Beauty’

Stradivari beguiles the senses with its tonal allure and impeccable sonic timing. One discerns a special relationship between player and instrument, almost as though they were inspiring one another to give of their best. Faust somehow finds a way to imbue her phrasing with a sense of expressive imperative, so that each movement feels like a compelling emotional journey. As a result, even when she momentarily steps outside convention by adopting a ghostly sul ponticello for the final appearance of K454’s finale rondo theme, one takes it in one’s stride as part and parcel of her take-nothing-for-granted interpretative style.

Alexander Melnikov, employing a glorious 2014 Kern copy of a 1795 Graf fortepiano, matches her all the way with playing of infectious poise and exuberance. On a modern concert instrument the bass inevitably needs taming, but here Melnikov’s left hand becomes a vital part of three-way musical communication with bracing results. Above all, Faust and Melnikov sound as though they are having the time of their lives. Producer Martin Sauer and engineer René Möller have captured these insightful performances in exemplary Mozartian sound that combines clarity with a gentle ambient glow and enticing physicality.

JULIAN HAYLOCK

PENDERECKI String Quartets nos.1–4; Der unterbrochene Gedanke; String Trio Tippett Quartet NAXOS 8.574288

Vivid playing that encompasses a lifetime of a composer’s music

Penderecki’s complete works for string quartet amount to less than 40 minutes of music (the String Trio adds another 13 here), but they span his whole compositional journey, from ground-breaking avant-gardist in the 1960s to much-mellowed 80-something just five years ago.

And he can pack an awful lot into the small time spans of each piece.

The first two quartets (1960 and 1968) make absorbing traversals of extended techniques, the latter unmistakeably influenced by Ligeti.

A 20-year break then takes us to his one unnumbered quartet, the twominute contrapuntal miniature Der unterbrochene Gedanke (The Interrupted Thought), and then to his String Trio (1990–91), a vigorous, two-movement work that is more obviously motivic in its construction and travels from dissonance to a hard-won sense of tonality by its end. By quartets nos.3 (2008, subtitled

‘Leaves from an Unwritten Diary’) and 4 (2016, conceivably unfinished), we’re not too far from autobiographical late Shostakovich in manner.

The playing of the Tippett Quartet is fully engaged with everything Penderecki’s music throws at it, from the gestural sonic aphorisms of the early works to the poignant melodising and rhythmic impact of the late ones. And it all comes across with spectacular vividness in this recording, with its generous stereo spread enhancing the interplay between all the different instruments.

MATTHEW RYE

VIVALDI Violin concertos: in C major RV194, D major RV211, E minor RV281, F major RV283, A major RV346, B flat major RV365 Boris Begelman (violin) Concerto Italiano/Rinaldo Alessandrini NAÏVE OP 7258

Another energetic and sparkling volume in the great complete concertos project

There are 110 Vivaldi violin concertos in the National University Library in Turin and much more besides. This is the latest CD in the great project by the Naïve record label to record the lot (see May’s Session Report). The F major Concerto RV283 gets it off to an explosive start, with fiddles imitating horn calls and mighty rhythmic impetus from the continuo section.

Boris Begelman is forward in the mix with energetic scales and arpeggios.

After a gentle central Largo the final Allegro is robust and tempestuous, with a terrific double-stopped chordal passage which sounds halfway to being a guitar. The B flat major Concerto RV365 has a mellower tinge, and Begelman brings delicacy as well as strength to its challenging and contracted figurations.

After the gaiety of the C major Concerto RV194 comes the D major RV211, the largest and grandest of the set. It opens in the style of a French overture, and the solo writing is both shamelessly virtuosic and constantly inventive, challenges Begelman tackles with aplomb before topping them off with a suitably extrovert cadenza. The Larghetto rocks gently, and in the final Allegro Begelman is happily robust, dancing and occasionally tender. The A major RV346 has an easy-going good humour, and the last concerto, the E minor RV281, provides a dramatic and turbulent ending to this fine set. Begelman and the Concerto Italiano are superb throughout, and the recorded sound is clear and resonant.

TIM HOMFRAY

ROOTS Music by Gershwin, Dvořák, Coleridge-Taylor, Price, Still, Perkinson and Foley Randall Goosby (violin) Zhu Wang (piano) Xavier Dubois Foley (double bass) DECCA 4851664

Auspicious debut reveals insightful perspective on black and US music

How to open a debut disc is always a dilemma, but few ambitious strings soloists would opt for their all-important first notes to be heard through the prism of a string duo.

So the fact that 24-year-old American violinist and YCat artist Randall Goosby has done exactly that, pairing up with young double bassistcomposer Xavier Dubois Foley for Foley’s own bluegrass/R&B-inspired Shelter Island, is immediately attractively intriguing. Plus, Goosby’s sound is then instantly exciting: lithe and silvery; a natural bluegrass, jazz and R&B voice singing with silky classical polish; a consummate collaborator.

It’s a knockout curtain-raiser, and the ensuing programme honouring black contributions to the classical music tradition – Goosby is the son of an African–American father and Korean mother – also hits one other notable bullseye that young artists regularly miss. Namely, saying something about who he is via under or unrecorded music that’s genuinely attention-grabbing and worthy of repeated listening – two qualities Goosby himself shines with.

Closing the programme, Dvořák’s Sonatina in G major is another triumph. One of the two works here by non-black composers who respected and admired their African– American and Native American contemporaries, it has significantly more audible American roots than usual – partly thanks to the preceding works, but also clearly through Goosby’s rare, 360-degree perspective on the American classical tradition.

CHARLOTTE GARDNER