Soji Violin

Duos don’t always have the temperament for the smouldering fires of Franck as well as the sudden whims of Debussy. Dumay and Pires join the select few. They take their time to find Debussy’s opening pulse, but they establish an individual, thoughtful freedom that ‘speaks’ sensuously and assertively. In the finale, they let unexpected passion grow from the central waltz, setting up a brilliant final flourish. Implicit in the initial, floated phrases of the Franck is a sense of the arduous journey to come. Intensity surges up by degrees towards the soul-torturing struggles at the sonata’s centre, and recedes before a gradual return of serenity and confidence.

Violinist Herwig Zack puts the spotlight on the unaccompanied four strings of his instrument, with J. S. Bach as the foundation, inspiring the 20th century composers Ben-Haim, Berio and Bloch. Violinist Herwig Zack, who produced a compelling and imaginative solo recording with Essentials (AV2155), follows with an equally inspired recital that casts the spotlight on the “4 strings only” of his unaccompanied violin. With J. S. Bach providing the foundations on which arguably all solo violin repertoire was created, Zack places his Second Sonata at the heart of the program and surrounds it with four mid-20th century works which were indelibly inspired by the Baroque master.

Acclaimed violinist and prolific recording artist Philippe Graffin scored a major coup when he unearthed the Violin Concerto of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, the Afro-English composer whose star has waned since the height of his fame at the turn of the last century, but has rapidly risen again on the strength of this world-premiere recording.

There are two really famous Beethoven violin sonatas, the Kreutzer and the Spring. The Kreutzer Sonata inspired the story by Leo Tolstoy, which in turn became the subject of Janácek's First String Quartet, so if you're into comparative studies in the arts, there's a thesis topic for you! The Spring Sonata was featured in Woody Allen's Love and Death, among other places. And perhaps most intriguingly of all, the scherzo of the late sonata, Op. 96, turns up quite clearly in the third movement of Mahler's Second Symphony.

Originally released in the 1980s as separate albums, Itzhak Perlman's recordings of Mozart's violin sonatas were reissued in this box set in 1991 as a special collector's edition. In these sonatas for keyboard and violin, the piano dominates as the violin often tags along in unison with the piano's melody, rarely departing from it except in an ornamental capacity. Even so, Perlman brings his customary good humor and energy to these pieces, and through his vibrant and spirited playing makes the violin's obbligato more or less equal to the pianist's elaborate part.

These are wonderful performances, full of the flair that made Stern famous. I was glad Sony chose this particular version of the Tchaikovsky with Ormandy and the Philadelphians for his "Life in Music" series, rather than Stern's later version with Berstein and the NYPO. This earlier recording captures Stern with more spontaneity and displays his virtuosity to greater effect. The faster passages of the Tchaikovsky are handled with ease, even at speeds faster than normally heard.