Salvatore Accardo, Laura Manzini Debussy, Ravel Music For Violin

The recording collaboration with the great violinist Salvatore Accardo continues, which began 29 years ago.

Of Grieg’s seventy-four published works, only five are for chamber music, and no less than three of these are Violin Sonatas. His favourite instrument was the piano, but the influence of Norwegian violinist and composer Ole Bull (1810-1880), patron of young Edvard’s career, was enormous. Grieg confessed to considering the Violin Sonatas among his best works, each representing a different phase in his development: ‘the first a little naive, but rich in ideas, the second Nordic, and the third with a broader horizon’, he wrote to his friend Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson. The composer’s connection to his homeland, Norway, was very deep.

With this disc, Vladimir Ashkenazy, celebrated for his readings of Rachmaninoff and Chopin, and his son, Vovka, take on music by Debussy and Ravel for two pianos, and the results, utterly unlike virtually anything Ashkenazy père has ever recorded before, make it a real winner. From the electric excitement of the opening En blanc et noir, through the hazy mysteries of Jeux, and the luminous colors of the Rapsodie espagnole, to the inexorable hysteria of La Valse, Ashkenazy père and fils turn in performances that match the music for poise, drive, and technical brilliance. Some might find their sonorities a bit hard-edged at points – should the opening of En blanc et noir and the close of La Valse really be hit so strongly? – but the results are so consistently thrilling that most listeners are likely to be swept away. Recorded in close but clear and vivid digital sound, this disc may not be for every Debussy and Ravel fan, but it should certainly appeal to fans of Ashkenazy.

Salvatore Accardo is an outstanding Italian violin virtuoso, best known as a master of the works of Niccolò Paganini, but equally accomplished across a wide variety of repertory for the instrument. His playing is characterized by a taut, visceral tone and a disciplined musical approach that avoids self-indulgence. Having also established himself as a successful conductor, chamber musician, and teacher, Accardo may be considered one of the most accomplished and influential musicians of his generation.

If you’re approaching these familiar Bach concertos for the first time, or want inexpensive performances that still provide decent musical rewards, then you won’t go far wrong with this Eloquence disc. Salvatore Accardo (who also directs the Chamber Orchestra of Europe) is soloist in the violin concertos in A minor and E major. Both are earnest, direct readings that hardly differ from Accardo’s EMI remakes.

Nicolas Altstaedt presents here his version of Esa-Pekka Salonen’s monumental Cello Concerto, originally composed for Yo-Yo Ma, and given its Finnish premiere by the Franco-German cellist under the composer’s direction. In partnership with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra and conductor Dima Slobodeniouk, he reveals its full expressive dimension here: ‘The first movement opens with what, in my sketchbook, was called “Chaos to line”’, says Esa-Pekka Salonen. Chaos, a metaphorical comet, a rhythmic mantra with congas and bongos, a wild dance . . . Salonen goes on to say of the third movement: ‘I imagined the orchestra as some kind of gigantic lung, expanding and contracting first slowly, but accelerating to a point of mild hyperventilation which leads back to the dance-like material’ The coupling is the famous ‘Duo Ravel’ (to give it the original title used at its premiere), which Nicolas Altstaedt and Pekka Kuusisto have been performing and refining ever since 2010, and which it was high time to record.

The Trio Metral, in its new line- up of Victor Metral (piano), Nathan Mierdl (violin) and Laure- Hélène Michel (cello) – three born chamber musicians – offers us a passionate and exciting reading of two masterpieces of the French repertory.

Fragoso’s music, influenced by Fauré and Debussy, shows a strong individual voice, intimate, lyrical and original. His complete output of chamber music is represented on this recording. Performed by excellent Portuguese soloists. New recording, world premieres! The death of António Fragoso (1897–1918) at the age of 21 robbed the Iberian Peninsula of a composer of great potential, the second within a century, following the Spaniard Juan Arriaga who died at the age of 20 in 1826, having displayed extraordinary promise.