Natalya Mnatsakanyan Ruben Kosemyan Plays Brahms Complete Sonatas & Scherzo

Member of the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, principal of the New World Symphony, and partner of Renée Fleming on the CD Bel Canto, clarinetist Todd Levy is hot stuff. Actually and more accurately, Todd Levy is mellow stuff – rich, lush, full, deep, and sweet stuff. In this, his first solo disc, Levy takes on four of the most Romantic works in the clarinet repertoire, that's Romantic with both an upper and a lower case R: Brahms' two late sonatas in F minor and E flat major plus Schumann's Fantasy Pieces and, naturally, his Romances. It's a match made in heaven: Levy wraps himself around each piece like a coat in late autumn, playing with a cantabile tone and a flawless technique.

After titanic contributions to the cello sonata repertoire by Ludwig van Beethoven, few notable additions were made for several decades. Not until 1862 did the cello sonata re-emerge in the hands of Johannes Brahms. His peculiar First Sonata contains only three movements (the Adagio having been omitted for fear of the sonata being too lengthy) and a finale that all but defies formal analysis. Almost a quarter century passed before Brahms again returned to the cello sonata, this time in the key of F major. The second sonata is considerably more challenging for cellists and Brahms' treatment of the instrument is not the exclusively lyrical, sonorous melodies that one might expect. Rather, Brahms incorporates lots of rhythmic, motivic playing and pizzicato passages and rapid bariolage. A "third" cello sonata, which has become increasingly popular in recent years, is Paul Klengel's (whose cello-playing father was much admired by Brahms) transcription of the G major Violin Sonata.

Friends of long standing as well as regular partners in chamber music, Michael Collins and Stephen Hough bring their combined musical insights and expertise to bear on Johannes Brahms’s sonatas for clarinet and piano. Together with the composer’s trio for clarinet, cello and piano and clarinet quintet, the sonatas are among the most treasured works in the repertoire of the instrument – but it is partly down to good luck that we have them at all. When Brahms in 1891 heard the clarinettist Richard Mühlfeld, principal clarinet of the Meiningen Court Orchestra, he had already announced his retirement. He was enraptured by Mühlfeld’s playing and its vocal qualities, however, and made a ‘comeback’: during the following couple of years he composed all four of his clarinet works.

Six years after their acclaimed disc devoted to Mendelssohn's works for cello and piano, Christian Poltera and Ronald Brautigam now tackle the two cello sonatas by Johannes Brahms, two central works in the repertoire, unquestionably the most important since those by Beethoven. The First Cello Sonata was composed between 1862 and 1865 when Brahms was in his thirties. He seemed intent on showcasing the lyricism of an instrument that is often compared to the human voice.

The three sonatas for violin and piano of Brahms are each in three movements, but they have more in commom with the composer's knotty late chamber music than with the amateur-oriented world of the majority of violin sonatas in the 19th century. Each elaborates a basic mood or structure, the first intensely songful, the second compact and full of symbolic allusion, and the third capricious and often ethereal. They need room and a certain broad, relaxed quality to bring out all the detail without losing the essential lyrical nature of the genre and all the songs that are quoted or evoked across the set. The requisite breadth is there in this release by the highly photogrenic Armenian-born duo of Sergey and Lusine Khachatryan.

Cet enregistrement est une lecture neuve, et décapante de ces œuvres bien connues. Ophélie Gaillard et son partenaire sont renversants d'énergie, de contrastes tout en gardant une constante justesse de ton. Ces pages parfois un brin poussiéreuse prodiguent ici un souffle de vitalité confondant. C'est pour moi l'enregistrement "parfait" à mettre d'urgence dans ses références absoules en matière de musique de chambre romantique.

The preeminent violin and piano partnership of Alina Ibragimova and Cédric Tiberghien give matchless accounts of Brahms's three Violin Sonatas. The works, which reveal the composer at his most lyrically reflective, are coupled with a fabulous encore by Clara Schumann.

In every way these perceptive and well-detailed readings stand in competition with the finest.

Brahms's three sonatas have been recorded many times, but there is always room for another interpretation as interesting as this one. These two players are consummate masters of their instruments; their approach is highly personal, but thoughtful, genuinely felt, and respectful of the text, with meticulously observed dynamics and carefully shaped phrases. The collaboration is impeccable, though it seems based on an attraction of opposites.

The Odeon Trio go for gold. Unlike either the Beaux Arts (Philips) or the Fontenay (Teldec), they use three CDs to include everything by Brahms that could possibly be called a piano trio, not forgetting the Op. 114 and Op. 40 wind trios, whose wind parts can well be rendered by strings. They decide, too, that the original 1853 version of the B major Trio is for them, rather than the revised version of 1889 which is more generally favoured.