He & She: Great Violin Sonatas
Posted by: herm on 21 April 2002
Great Violin Sonatas
For a while now StephenJohn and I have been talking about violin sonatas on the Bashmet thread, and I thought let's take it to a separate place. This after all is an extraordinary genre, in which two completely different instruments - keyboard and violin - are entwined, invoking notions of the masculine and the feminine, power and melody&hellip
Why don't I invite you to talk about your favorite sonatas by listing a couple of mine?
J.S. Bach: c minor 1017 (Koopman / Huggett)
Mozart: KV 379 in G with the big variations. My parents used to have this gorgeous performance by Richter and Oleg Kagan on Russian vinyl.
The violin sonata is not really Mozart's genre; still the B flat sonata K 454 ought to be mentioned too.
Beethoven Hate to say it, but he Kreutzer sonata is pretty unbeatable. The tenth and last sonata in G (op 96) is very interesting too. (I like Ashkenazy and Perlman)
Brahms Brahms wrote three violin sonatas and especially the second in A and the third in d are astounding pieces. In the second there's a middle movement that mixes andante sections with scherzo stuff. It's impossibly hard to perform, and then there's the finale which is a very driven piece of music.
Brahms 3 starts out of nothing, as if the music was already there; the slow movement is heart on the sleeve, I did it my way playing, and there's much more to come. (My favorite version is by Arthur Grumiaux)
Faure Next I'd recommend Faure's first sonata op 13. Listen to the andante and you'll know why.
Debussy This is perhaps the best written piece in the genre after Brahms's second sonata. And I don't just mean cleverly written. It's got emotional depths you'll come back to time and again. (Again Grumiaux)
So why don't I stop here and see what your recommendations are?
Herman
For a while now StephenJohn and I have been talking about violin sonatas on the Bashmet thread, and I thought let's take it to a separate place. This after all is an extraordinary genre, in which two completely different instruments - keyboard and violin - are entwined, invoking notions of the masculine and the feminine, power and melody&hellip
Why don't I invite you to talk about your favorite sonatas by listing a couple of mine?
J.S. Bach: c minor 1017 (Koopman / Huggett)
Mozart: KV 379 in G with the big variations. My parents used to have this gorgeous performance by Richter and Oleg Kagan on Russian vinyl.
The violin sonata is not really Mozart's genre; still the B flat sonata K 454 ought to be mentioned too.
Beethoven Hate to say it, but he Kreutzer sonata is pretty unbeatable. The tenth and last sonata in G (op 96) is very interesting too. (I like Ashkenazy and Perlman)
Brahms Brahms wrote three violin sonatas and especially the second in A and the third in d are astounding pieces. In the second there's a middle movement that mixes andante sections with scherzo stuff. It's impossibly hard to perform, and then there's the finale which is a very driven piece of music.
Brahms 3 starts out of nothing, as if the music was already there; the slow movement is heart on the sleeve, I did it my way playing, and there's much more to come. (My favorite version is by Arthur Grumiaux)
Faure Next I'd recommend Faure's first sonata op 13. Listen to the andante and you'll know why.
Debussy This is perhaps the best written piece in the genre after Brahms's second sonata. And I don't just mean cleverly written. It's got emotional depths you'll come back to time and again. (Again Grumiaux)
So why don't I stop here and see what your recommendations are?
Herman