Reading January Gramophone (Bruckner cover), the recording of the month was by French cellist Bruno Philippe/pianist Tanguy de Williencourt/Christian Eschenbach/Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra. My primary interest was in the César Franck Sonata for violin & piano, transcribed to cello with Franck’s approval by French cellist Jules Delsart. I started listening and was again impressed with Mssr. Philippe’s astonishing cantabile cello playing, but decided I would go back to the violin version(s) before completing my listen.
César Franck (1886) was thinking of composing a sonata (for cello or violin unclear), when his friend Eugène Ysaÿe commissioned him to write one for his wedding. Using Fauré’s violin sonata as inspiration, he completed this cyclical work in two months. Charles Bordes presented the work to Eugène Ysaÿe on the morning of his wedding and it was first performed on this occasion after some hasty rehearsals on borrowed instruments. Ysaÿe performed the work for the next 40 y. Ravel and Debussy were both critical, finding it lacking in natural warmth. Repeated listening to the performances below suggests otherwise.
It has, in the recent past, been a staple in almost every violinist’s repertoire, but performance frequency recently diminished. The best performances have nearly equal emphasis on both the violinist and pianist, as the composer intended. Each of these (below) recorded performances are excellent (and many are courtesy of a wonderful Caroline Gill review in Gramophone 2015) and I highly recommend them all. A passage that deeply appeals to me is at ~ 4 min in the Recitativo-Fantasia, an achingly beautiful section.
This performance (brought to my attention by David Hurwitz) may be my favorite overall a young Krystian Zimerman and a splendidly lyrical Kaja Danczowska. The Szymanowski Mythes is also superb on this recording.
What a combination! Heifetz performed this piece in his last concert.
Another remarkable performance.
On the violin part, it’s a toss-up between Augustin Dumay, Christian Ferras and Kaja Danczowska. On piano, Krystian Zimmerman, Jean-Philippe Collard and Khatia Buniatishvili, but this is splitting hairs. All the performances are excellent.
Back to the original reason for this note. The Bruno Philippe/Tanguy de Williencourt performances are superb, although, perhaps because of the cello’s more resonant tone, I find it more darkly emotive than the violin performances. Still processing this. It is wonderful. Will listen a few more times to see if I’m mishearing something the performers don’t intend. Cantabile, though, rings through, loud and clear on the cello and is masterful. Mssr. Philippe states that he is inspired in voicing by Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau. The two instruments complement each other beautifully, rather than competing. Both musicians are on my “to follow” list and were before with their Evidence label Brahms & Schumann: Works for cello and piano.
Oh yes, the rest of the album is also superb. I particularly enjoyed the Fauré and Saint-Saëns.
