Capuçon

A violinist in a class of his own, Renaud Capuçon shows why he is 'Le Violon Roi'; (The Violin King) in this 3-CD collection. As the leading French violinist of his generation, Capucon records exclusively for Virgin Classics and has a rich discography. The set brings together not only some of his best and most popular performances as a soloist but as a collaborator.

The nearly uninterrupted string of strong, successful albums produced by cellist Gautier Capuçon (and indeed his violinist brother, Renaud) demonstrates that the CD debut Face à Face was not just a fluke produced by child prodigies. Rather, Face à Face was a springboard for what has proven to be an enduring career and ever-improving musicianship. On this latest album without his brother, Gautier collaborates with pianist Gabriela Montero on the cello sonatas of Rachmaninov and Prokofiev. Fans of Capuçon's playing will recall that he had previously released a recording of the Rachmaninov sonata with pianist Lilya Zilberstein on the EMI label in 2003. While it may seem questionable to make duplicate recordings when he has recorded so little of the cello repertoire, it offers listeners an opportunity to see how his playing continues to mature even over a short span of five years. While some of the tempos are a little different than the 2003 recording, the most notable difference is that of sound, which has developed impressively with the help of his magnificent 1701 Gofriller cello. His command of sound is most obvious in the solo opening of the Prokofiev sonata.

The stellar young Capuçon brothers seem incapable of setting a foot wrong on disc and they put their considerable chamber-music experience to great use in Brahms's final orchestral work, with cellist Gautier Capuçon proving an eloquent lead in the vehement first movement.

Renaud Capuçon, the 24 year-old French violinist, nominated as New Talent of the Year 2000 by the French Victoires de la Musique, is now an exclusive artist with Virgin Classics label, and this debut album, looks, on the face of it, like a Beecham lollipops album (though TB would never have tolerated a soloist to rival him), but it is rather more sophisticated than that.

Recorded in Feburary 2020 at the Philharmonie de Paris / La Seine Musicale. Gautier Capuçon says: “In music, in life, communication is the essence of everything and of anything… You share something.”

Elgar's violin concerto - distinctively passionate and nostalgic - is one of the great late-Romantic concertos. "It is a huge piece," says Renaud Capuçon "both in terms of it's length and it's romantic and noble nature." This is Capuçon's first recording with Sir Simon Rattle, here conducting the London Symphony Orchestra. When Rattle chose Elgar's Enigma Variations for his inaugural concert as the LSO's music director in 2017, he was celebrating the close historic links between the composer and the orchestra. Not only did the LSO accompany Fritz Kreisler in the premiere of the violin concerto in 1910, Elgar became it's Principal Conductor the following year. Paired with the concerto on this album is his violin sonata, first performed in 1919. Renaud Capuçon, who calls the sonata "a work of nobility and tenderness", is joined by one of the leading British pianists of today, Stephen Hough.