CD Reviews (The Straits Times, April 2016)

RACHMANINOV & CHOPIN

Cello Sonatas

ALISA WEILERSTEIN, Cello

INON BARNATAN, Piano

Decca 478 8416 / *****

Here are two cello sonatas written by composers whose main instrument was the piano, and both are coincidentally in the key of G minor. Rachmaninov's sonata (composed in 1901) is the better known, written at around the same time as his Second Piano Concerto and Second Suite for two pianos, which share a wealth of melody and luscious harmonies. 

Chopin's sonata (1847) was his last published work, filled with mellowness and a rich vein of lyricism. Both are in 4 movements, including achingly beautiful slow movements which have become hits in their own right.

American cellist Alisa Weilerstein coaxes a luxuriant and gorgeous tone, complemented by Israeli pianist Inon Barnatan's virtuosic yet sensitive partnership. The fill-ups are also well-chosen.  Rachmaninov's mellifluous Vocalise is soulfully rendered. 

A transcription by Auguste Franchomme (Chopin's close friend and favourite cellist) of the Etude in C sharp minor (Op.25 No.7), which sometimes carries the nickname “Cello”, seems like a natural choice. Finally, Chopin's early Introduction & Polonaise Brillante (Op.3) closes the recital in a blaze of fireworks. Here are 81 minutes of hugely enjoying listening.     

AN AMERICAN IN PARIS

TAMSIN WALEY-COHEN, Violin

HUW WATKINS, Piano

Champs Hill 059 / ****1/2  

The 1920s ushered in a new era of music in which European composers readily embraced the influence of music from the New World, namely African-American jazz. This interesting anthology by young British violinist Tamsin Waley-Cohen explores both sides of the Atlantic, American composers making their mark in this home-grown musical language and French composers intoxicated by the blues and syncopated rhythms. 

The two main works are the Violin Sonatas of Francis Poulenc (1943) and Maurice Ravel (1927). Poulenc's bittersweet idiom was in this instance inspired by the murder of poet Federico Garcia Lorca during the Spanish Civil War, while Ravel's includes a toe-tapping Blues as its slow movement.

The Americans are represented by Charles Ives and George Gershwin. Ives' Decoration Day was a movement from his Holidays Symphony, where distant memories of old band tunes were being reheard through the prism of time. 

Six popular songs from Gershwin's Afro-American folk opera Porgy And Bess benefit from Jascha Heifetz's slick arrangements, and the rarity is Heifetz's last transcription, a 6-minute distillation of tunes from An American In Paris (and completed by his Indonesia-born assistant Ayke Agus), which seems all too short. The performances here are marked by an infectious vitality, and deserve repeated listening.

CD Reviews (The Straits Times, June 2015)

SCHUMANN Piano Works

IMOGER COOPER, Piano

Chandos 10755 & 10841 / *****

These are the first two discs of what appears to a recorded cycle of piano works of German Romantic composer Robert Schumann (1810-1856), by esteemed British pianist Imogen Cooper, offering very satisfying fill-ups by composers of his immediate circle.

The first CD showcases Schumann as a supreme craftsman of both miniatures and larger canvasses. His eight Fantasiestucke Op.12 (Fantasy Pieces) runs the full gamut of expression, from the blissful calm of Des Abends (Evening), virtuosic upheavals of In der Nacht (In The Night) and the flight of whimsy in Traumes Wirren (Restless Dreams). Also in eight but linked parts is Kreisleriana Op.16, one of his greatest rhapsodic works, inspired by author E.T.A.Hoffmann's literary creation. The Theme and Variations in D minor (from the First String Sextet) by the precocious Johannes Brahms, who was a young confidante of the Schumanns, makes a sober but apt addition.    

The second disc is dominated by the multi-part Humoreske Op.20, another work alternating lyricism and turbulence (although less stormy than Kreisleriana), and the First Sonata in F sharp minor Op.11, the most often performed of his three sonatas. One point of interest is the inclusion of his teenaged wife-to-be Clara Wieck's Le Ballet des Revenants (Op.5 No.4), which shares the same theme as the 1^st movement exposition of the sonata. Cooper performs these in succession, establishing the thematic and emotional links between the two lovers. The performances in both discs are unfailingly musical and enhance the appreciation of the Schumanns and their world.

1917 WORKS FOR VIOLIN & PIANO

TAMSIN WALEY-COHEN, Violin

HUW WATKINS, Piano

Signum Classics 376 (2 CDs) / ****1/2

The year 1917 was a tumultuous one. Europe was still in mired in war while the Russian tsar had just been overthrown. Music was entering into a modernistic, iconoclastic and atonal phase. The works on this album by four major composers, all written in this year, recorded their reactions to the earth-shaking events around them. All are tonal but radically different.

Debussy's Violin Sonata in G minor was conceived near his death, a brief rhapsodic work that meant to freely espouse French aesthetics while repudiating stolid German ones. Sibelius' Five Pieces Op.81 have a salon quality and include a mazurka, waltz, rondino and minuet, charming dances bringing to mind the bygone world of Kreisler's miniatures. Respighi's Violin Sonata in B minor is darkly hewn but concludes with a passacaglia, the ancient variations form from the baroque. Elgar's Violin Sonata in E minor also looks back with nostalgia to a more innocent age but not without struggles to cope with the present.

Young British violinist Tamsin Waley-Cohen coaxes a beautiful tone from her 1721 Stradivarius, capturing both the dramatic and lyrical vistas of these works. Both she and pianist Huw Watkins are vividly recorded, and this 85-minute recital (on 2 discs priced as one) never fails to engage.