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Brahms - Violin Sonatas Nos 1, 2 & 3

£13.60

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Label: Challenge Classics

Cat No: CC72194

Barcode: 0608917219425

Format: CD

Number of Discs: 1

Genre: Chamber

Release Date: 25th February 2008

Works

Brahms, Johannes

Violin Sonata no.1 in G major, op.78
Violin Sonata no.2 in A major, op.100
Violin Sonata no.3 in D minor, op.108

Artists

Modern Times_1800

Works

Brahms, Johannes

Violin Sonata no.1 in G major, op.78
Violin Sonata no.2 in A major, op.100
Violin Sonata no.3 in D minor, op.108

Artists

Modern Times_1800

About

Brahms wrote his Violin Sonata in G Op.78 in Bonn in 1878-9. After a well disposed, lively Vivace ma non troppo, the mood is reversed in a serious Adagio. In the third movement, Brahms quotes from Regenlied Op.59 No.3 (text by Klaus Groth), written a few years before.

The earliest sketches of the A major Sonata Op.100 date from the summer of 1883, while he was working on the Third Symphony. Brahms himself pointed out that in the first movement motifs from his Lieder can be found, above all Wie Melodien zieht es mir, op. 105 no. 1.

The opening movement of the Sonata in D minor Op.108 presents a restless picture of interpenetrating layers of mood. It leads to an Adagio that begins in almost chorale-like fashion after which the theme is then becomes ‘Hungarian’ or ‘Gypsy’ in style. The final movement is a stormy rondo.

Ilia Korol was born in Kiev and studied violin under Abraham Stern and Marini Lashvili at Moscow’s Music Academy. He has performed as concert master with various major ensembles including Musica Antiqua Köln and the Bach Ensemble, and is one of the artistic directors of the the young Austrian chamber orchestra Modern Times_1800. He plays a violin of Cai von Stietencron in the traditional style of Cremona, Italy; however, it features ‘modernisations’ of the kind that were usual in the period of Brahms. In other words the neck, bass-bar, finger board and bridge were altered to achieve a more brilliant, powerful tone. But in Vienna gut strings were still being used; this recording follows suit.

Natalia Grigorieva comes from Moscow where she studied the piano at the Conservatory. She is a founder member of Modern Times_1800. On this recording she plays a Streicher grand piano of 1870, one which is probably very close to the instrument that in 1868 Brahms received as a present from the firm of Streicher for his flat in Vienna. The bass is powerful, very sonorous, rich in overtones and never muffled; the high notes are clear and focussed, without being pointed.

Both artists here perform as a duo version of Modern Times_1800.