Part Violin

Federico Guglielmo whittles down his ensemble L’Arte dell’Arco to just three or four players for his latest release of Vivaldi’s music. Unlike other Vivaldi performers, Guglielmo is keen to return to the transparency of the Prete Rosso’s music, stripping away the ornate embellishments that have encumbered recent recordings, allowing the fluid lines to speak for themselves. In these Violin and Trio Sonatas, Guglielmo and his fellow musicians once again establish themselves as some of the foremost interpreters of the Italian’s music. For the most part bright and jolly, these sonatas demand to be played with charm and joie de vivre, which L’Arte dell’Arco certainly supply in abundance.

Sergei Prokofiev first noted down some ideas for his Violin Sonata No.1 in the summer of 1938 and he began the composition that winter. It was later put aside, but when he was evacuated from Moscow after the Nazi invasion 1941, the unfinished violin sonata was one of the pieces Prokofiev took with him. It wasn't until 1946 that he completed the work, however, following it up with the equally dark Sixth Symphony. There is no doubt that it was bitter experience that made these works two of Prokofiev's most powerfully concentrated compositions.

Itzhak Perlman: The Complete Warner Recordings embraces every aspect of Perlman's art. It contains concertos (the ‘essential' concertos, of course, but also more rarely-heard works, including Perlman's own commissions from living composers); other pieces for violin and orchestra; chamber music; recital and crossover repertoire (including jazz, ragtime and klezmer), and even a disc that focuses on Perlman as narrator and (briefly) opera singer. The recordings document his collaborations with the world's greatest orchestras and an array of superlative fellow-soloists and conductors, including Martha Argerich, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Daniel Barenboim, Plácido Domingo, Carlo Maria Giulini, Bernard Haitink, Lynn Harrell, Yo Yo Ma, Zubin Mehta, Seiji Ozawa, André Previn and Pinchas Zukerman.

For Mozart, wind instruments had their own voices, full of warmth and tenderness, as much as singers did, and his concertos are animated with an operatic sense of drama. His own experience as a violinist allowed him to write five concertos for the instrument that are full of sparky virtuosity, here conveyed with sovereign authority by Henryk Szeryng. This collection (originally released as part of the legendary Philips Classics Mozart Edition) is full of truly authoritative performances featuring internationally acclaimed artists.

For newcomers to the work of Estonian composer Arvo Pärt, this generous two-disc collection of performances from EMI's archive would be a good place to start exploring. The authoritative Pärt performances would probably be the premiere releases on ECM, produced by Manfred Eicher, but these performances are all of a very high quality and there is a handful of works that ECM has never recorded. Pärt's most famous works are here; there are three versions each of the ever-popular Fratres (for violin and piano, string orchestra and harp, and string quartet) and Summa (for mixed voices, string orchestra, and string quartet), as well as the version of Spiegel in Spiegel for violin and piano, Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten for string orchestra and bell, and the concerto for two violins and prepared piano, Tabula rasa.

At the occasion of the 70th birthday of Swedish contemporary composer Anders Hillborg, the award-winning conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen and Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra release an album with some of his most recognizable works. Together with violinist Eldbjorg Hemsing and soprano Hannah Holgersson they have recorded Hillborg's compositions: 'Liquid Marble', 'Kvall' and 'Violin Concerto No. 2'. Anders Hillborg has become one of the leading contemporary classical composers of our time with works commissioned and performed by Los Angeles Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony, Berlin Philharmonic, Carnegie Hall or Royal Stockholm Philharmonic. Notable musicians he's worked with include clarinetist Martin Frost, soprano Renee Fleming, violinist Lisa Batiashvili, violist Lawrence Power or such renown conductors as Esa-Pekka Salonen, Alan Gilbert, Gustavo Dudamel and David Zinman.