Melodiya presents recordings of the outstanding violist Mikhail Kugel.

Mikhail Kugel combined a career as a solo performer with membership of the celebrated Beethoven Quartet (in its last line-up), was a professor of the Moscow Conservatory, and later on of the Jerusalem Rubin Academy of Music and Dance. At present, he teaches at the Royal Conservatory of Ghent in Belgium. Mikhail Kugel has expanded the viola repertoire by making numerous arrangements of music from different eras for the viola. Some of them are featured on this disc.

The works for viola and piano were recorded by Mikhail Kugel together with Boris Berezovsky, one of the most in-demand pianists of modern time, a first prize winner of the Tchaikovsky International Competition and an owner of Gramophone, Diapason d’Or, BBC and Echo klassik awards for the best classical recordings.

The recordings were made at Kugel’s concerts in 2002 to 2013.