This month’s selection features echoes, postcards, paths and cyborg pianists
Beethoven Cello Sonatas
Gary Hoffman (cello), David Selig (piano) La Dolce Volta LDV111.2 (2-discs) Here, Beethoven’s five cello sonatas, spanning his early, middle and late periods, are joyfully sinuous – and even the thorny later works benefit from a clear musical purpose that only supreme technical competence and years of committed partnership can bring. Outstanding. (CS) ★★★★★
Richard Cameron-Wolfe
Telesthesia Antwerp Cello Quartet Antarctica AR055
This intriguing work is inspired by the memory of a close friend. The subtitle – ‘13 episodes/deliberations on multi-planar syzygy’ – refers to post-death ‘sightings’ of that friend, and like those near-encounters, the piece features an array of ‘almost’ melodies, frustratingly interrupted. (CS) ★★★
Chausson • Ravel Piano Trios
Trio Metral La Dolce Volta LDV122 From the wistful Romanticism of Chausson’s Pas trop lent first movement to the fanfares as Ravel marches off to war in his closing Animé, these performances of two much-loved French trios show poise and passion aplenty. Recommended. (JP) ★★★★
Farrenc Piano
Trios Nos 2 & 4; Sonata No. 1 etc Linos Ensemble CPO 555538-2 The Linos excel again in Farrenc. Her chamber music best showcases the composer’s gift for melody, often offset by poignant harmonies. Piano and strings are beautifully balanced in the Second Trio; the flute gets a vigorous workout in the Fourth. (SW) ★★★★★
Henze The Raft of the Medusa
Arnold Schoenberg Chor et al Capriccio C5482 Written in 1968, Henze’s darkly abrasive work for soloists, chorus and orchestra – with spoken German dialogue – vividly conveys the many horrors faced by the survivors of a notorious 1816 shipwreck that was famously depicted by painter Théodore Géricault. (JP) ★★★
Korngold Chamber Works
Bruno Monteiro (violin) et al Etcetera KTC1774
Written at 13, Korngold’s vivacious, harmonically adventurous Op. 1 Trio needs no special ‘juvenilia’ pleading. The Violin Sonata, from the grand old age of 16, captivates from its ambitious, symphonic opening onwards. A resonant acoustic sacrifices a scintilla of clarity. (SW) ★★★★
Leiviskä Symphony No. 1 etc
Oliver Triendl (piano); Staatskapelle Weimar/Ari Rasilainen Hänssler Classic HC23050 (2-discs) Helvi Leiviskä’s Piano Concerto of 1935 makes no huge stylistic leaps from, say, Brahms’s Second, bu
