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Reger: Complete Sonatas for Unaccompanied Violin / Mathe

Sono Luminus

$21.99 Nov 17, 2009

REGER Sonatas for Unaccompanied Violin, op. 91: No. 1 in a; No. 2 in D; No. 3 in B?; No. 4 in b; No. 5 in e; No. 6 in G; No. 7 in a • Ulrike-Anima Mathé (vn) • DORIAN 90915 (2 CDs: 115:44)

Having just reviewed a recording of Reger’s suites for solo viola with Tabea Zimmermann for the previous issue, I was pleased to receive this sumptuously reconstituted set from Dorian of the composer’s complete op. 91 sonatas for solo violin. Max Reger, it seems, is beginning to attract more mainstream attention and more of an audience than has heretofore been the case.

Reger’s seven sonatas for solo violin are important additions to the repertoire, and choice in recorded versions is extremely limited. Therefore, I do not wish to be too critical of this retread, which was originally (and still is) available as two separate discs. But I must get one thing out of the way right off the bat. Once upon a time, Dorian was roundly criticized for recordings with such excessive reverberation that they sounded like they’d been made in an echo chamber. The company apparently took the criticism to heart, for their releases that followed were significantly less echoey. Unfortunately, these not-new recordings, made in the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall in Troy, New York, in 1992 and 1994, come from a period during which Dorian’s engineers were pursuing their sinful ways. I’ve heard quite a few more recent recordings that emanate from this venue, so I can vouch for the fact that it’s a hall with superb acoustics that sound nothing like this. The impression one receives the instant Ulrike-Anima Mathé’s bow touches the strings is of a vast, cavernous space that makes her violin sound three times normal size and dimensionally distorted.

That being said, judgment of Mathé’s playing should not be based on what her makeup artists did to pump it up on steroids. She articulates Reger’s difficult double-stopping and string crossings cleanly and with exceptional incisiveness. Her left-hand work is equally deft, capable of delivering pitch-perfect intonation and invigorating velocity. And though it’s hard to judge her tone quality due to the souped-up sound, I suspect that it would be quite pleasing to hear in a normal setting.

Reger-phobia is unwarranted. Anyone who has ever read anything about Reger or had any exposure to his music knows that he was obsessive-compulsive when it came to writing fugues, and that he had a “thing” about Bach. That fixation, however, led to the creation of some fascinating and intellectually stimulating music. If you enjoy listening to Bach’s sonatas and partitas for unaccompanied violin, you are virtually guaranteed to enjoy Reger’s sonatas, for they are Bach revisited and reheard through 1905 ears.

The technical difficulties posed by Reger’s sonatas are similar to those posed by Bach’s works for unaccompanied violin. To produce the harmony and the effect of multiple voices engaged in contrapuntal interplay, it is necessary to notate miles of double- and triple-stops and awkward string crossings, something that is neither easy nor natural to play on an instrument better suited to producing a single-voiced melody. Thus, works of this type require a technical whiz of virtuoso caliber, but they are not virtuosic display pieces in the same way that Paganini’s, Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst’s, or Eugène Ysaÿe’s somewhat later works for solo violin are. Reger’s sonatas, however, are no more boring, academic exercises than are Bach’s sonatas and partitas. The initial appeal may be intellectual, but gradually the music grows on you and blossoms into something entirely satisfying on an emotional level.

At the time these recordings were made, Mathé showed every promise of being a rising star. I’m not quite sure what has happened to her since. I reviewed a cpo CD of Friedrich Kiel’s piano quartets in Fanfare 31:5 in which she played violin; but other than that, on record at least, it doesn’t appear that she’s been very active, which is too bad, because her playing here is exceptionally good. And, as mentioned above, recordings of Reger’s op. 91 complete are few and far between. The only other current listing I find is on Troubadisc with violinist Renate Eggebrecht-Kupsa. Her account of the sonatas may be very fine (she has way more recordings listed than does Mathé), but I haven’t heard it.

Reger’s sonatas need not appeal exclusively to listeners who have a special interest in music for solo violin. So, provisionally recommended, as long as you can adjust to the recorded sound. Otherwise, you might wish to explore Eggebrecht-Kupsa’s version, although it’s pricey. I suspect, though I don’t know for sure since it was not yet listed at the time of writing, that the Dorian set, being a repackaging job, may be sold as a twofer.

FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

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Reger: Complete Sonatas for Unaccompanied Violin / Mathe
Sono Luminus Nov 2009
CD
$21.99

Liszt: B-a-c-h Variations, Piano Sonata / Markus Groh

Avie Records

SACD

$20.99 Mar 01, 2006

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.

R E V I E W S

No easy listening here. Groh offers a monumental reading of the Sonata hewn from stone, with dark colors, generally measured tempos, and a crushing weight. In his curious program note (it’s framed as a letter to Liszt, but it tells the composer mostly things he already knows), Groh not only points to the Faust legend, but also suggests that the sonata has “parallels with the story of the Creation in the Bible.” His lengthy analysis, though, pretty much drops the analogy once it’s gotten past the opening measures—and rightly so. For the progress of the Liszt Sonata has nothing in common with Genesis; and what little light and Edenic joy the music might contain is blocked out by the almost unrelievedly grim intensity of the interpretation. Not even the fugue (played with exceptional clarity) has much spark or impetuosity.

In the end, then, Groh’s reading brings the music closer in spirit to Byron’s Manfred (with its self-lacerating guilt) than to either Faust or the Bible—but the music certainly supports that interpretation, and Groh the performer (as opposed to Groh the writer) makes a persuasive advocate. The careful shading of the opening measures holds out the promise of a performance of great expressive depth, taking nothing for granted—a promise that’s fulfilled in the artful shaping of the recitatives, the inevitable growth of the crescendos, the assurance of the phrasing, and the staggering conviction of the climaxes. I’m not quite ready to admit this CD to the inner circle with Argerich, Horowitz (the early recording), Ernst Levy, Hough, Pollini, Richter, and a handful of others; but it’s certainly close, and readers with several recordings on their shelves already should find this a gripping alternative view.

The Fantasy and Fugue responds well to the same epic approach—but I’m marginally less convinced by Totentanz. No complaints about his technique: in that regard, this is as stunning a performance as its companions. But Groh gives us a remarkably unironic reading of a piece that’s fueled by sardonic wit—and for all the detail, for all the striking contrasts, it seems to be a bit too monolithic. Still and all, this is a significant contribution to the Liszt catalog—and I’m eager to hear more from this remarkably talented musician.

FANFARE: Peter J. Rabinowitz

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Liszt: B-a-c-h Variations, Piano Sonata / Markus Groh
Avie Records Mar 2006
SACD
$20.99

Brahms: Sonatas for Violin and Piano

Centaur Records

$18.99 Aug 02, 2019

This is a truly first-rate recording of the three Brahms Sonatas for Violin and Piano. This album has the added bonus of the Scherzo in C minor from the Brahms F-A-E Sonata for Violin & Piano, WoO2. Federico Agostini is a violinist renowned as a soloist, chamber musician, and teacher. He has appeared in various international music festivals in Europe, the United States, and Japan and has performed chamber music with many distinguished artists, including Bruno Giuranna, Jaime Laredo, Joseph Silverstein, and Janos Starker as well as with members of the American, Emerson, Fine Arts, Tokyo, and Guarneri quartets. Derek Han is without a doubt among the leading American pianists of his generation. Though he was originally identified with the concertos of Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven he possesses a vast repertory that includes the concertos of Mendelssohn, Chopin, and MacDowell, as well as individual concertos by Rachmaninov, Tchaikovsky, and Shostakovich, in addition to a large body of solo and chamber works. Han's style is original though fairly straightforward in it's lucid tones, spirited character, and technical fluidity and accuracy.

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Brahms: Sonatas for Violin and Piano
Centaur Records Aug 2019
CD
$18.99

Vladimir Feltsman: The Complete Columbia Album Collection

Sony Masterworks

$39.98 Jul 05, 2019

In summer 1987, nine years after he first requested permission to emigrate, the 35-year-old Russian pianist Vladimir Feltsman was finally allowed to leave the Soviet Union. Feltsman, who had studied at the Moscow Conservatory with the legendary Yakov Flier and won first prize at the prestigious Long-Thibaud Competition in Paris at the age of 19, arrived in New York amid a welter of publicity. CBS Masterworks offered him a recording contract, while President Ronald Reagan welcomed him to the White House for a recital that was glowingly reviewed in the New York Times.

When Feltsman made his Carnegie Hall debut two months later, the Times hailed him as “an artist of wide musical interests who on this occasion included three pieces from Messiaen’s Vingt Regards sur l’Enfant Jésusto set off more popular works by Schubert and Schumann … Mr. Feltsman took an aptly spacious and relaxed approach to the first two movements [of Schubert’s A major Sonata D 664)] … He then let loose in the more brilliant Allegro finale with an impressive display of breathtaking scales … In the Messiaen, Mr. Feltsman drew out its great, clashing sonorities and made light of its technical terrors. At the conclusion of Schumann’sSymphonic Etudes, any lingering doubts about Mr. Feltsman’s pianistic strengths or artistic instincts were blown away.”

Interest in Feltsman’s pianism had already been piqued before the pianist set foot in the New World by a performance, released by CBS in 1986, of the Chopin Preludes recorded in Moscow. “Feltsman sweeps through the 24 Preludes with genuine poetic bravura,” wrote the Los Angeles Times. “There is a daring and Romantic fire in the playing which only add to the agony of his plight.”

Now Sony Classical is reissuing that Carnegie debut recital from 1987, a Russian Chopin recording that preceded it and an even earlier Schubert recital, from Paris in 1978, along with all the other Feltsman performances captured by CBS mics before his collaboration with the label ended in 1989. Among them are a live Liszt recital including the B minor Sonata and a live Rachmaninoff coupling of the Third Concerto andRhapsody on a Theme of Paganini with Zubin Mehta and the Israel Philharmonic: “Feltsman’s pianistic control compels admiration. He is a commanding player.” (Gramophone).

He also recorded the First and Third Tchaikovsky concertos with Washington’s National Symphony Orchestra under Mstislav Rostropovich, who, wrote Gramophone’s reviewer, “coaxes out playing of the very highest quality – rich-toned, idiomatic in inflexion, with just the right degree of thrust when required … [Feltsman’s] is a relatively laid back view of the First Concerto – no screaming in the outer movements, no flash-fingered shallowness in the central prestissimo of the slow movement. The big first movement cadenza is wonderfully fluid and continuous, and the transition into the following coda is a dream. There is much sensitive dialogue between piano and orchestra, well captured by the recording … a performance one can learn from, and the Third Concerto goes splendidly.”

Feltsman’s last CBS recording featured the first two Prokofiev Piano Concertos and ten pieces from Romeo and Juliet: “One has only to hear the refinement of colour he produces in ‘Romeo bids Juliet farewell’ … or the clarity and lightness of articulation in the First Concerto to realize that he possesses not only formidable fingers but very considerable artistry … The LSO under Michael Tilson Thomas produce excellent support … Again [in Concerto No. 2] there is splendid pianism from Feltsman and cultured playing from Tilson Thomas and the LSO.”

SET CONTENTS:

DISC 1:
Chopin: Préludes, Op. 28

DISC 2:
Schubert: Fantasy in C Major, Op. 15, D. 760 "Wanderer"
Schubert: Moments musicaux, Op. 94, D. 780

DISC 3:
Schubert: Sonata for Piano in A Major, Op. 120, D. 664
Messiaen: Vingt regards sur L'enfant-Jésus

DISC 4:
Schumann: Symphonic Études (Variations) in C-Sharp Minor, Op. 13
Rachmaninoff: Prélude in G-Sharp Minor, Op. 32, No. 12
Beethoven: 6 Variations on an Original Theme in D Major, Op. 76

DISC 5:
Rachmaninoff: Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, Op. 30
Rachmaninoff: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, Op. 43
Conductor: Zubin Mehta
Performer: Israel Philharmonic Orchestra

DISC 6:
Prokofiev: Piano Concerto No. 1 in D-Flat Major, Op. 10
Prokofiev: Piano Concerto No. 2 in G Minor, Op. 16 (1923 Version)
Prokofiev: 10 Pieces from Romeo and Juliet, Op. 75: No. 10, Romeo and Juliet before Parting
Conductor: Michael Tilson Thomas
Orchestra: London Symphony Orchestra

DISC 7:
Liszt: Sonata in B Minor
Liszt: Tre Sonetti di Petrarca
Liszt: St. Francis d'Assise: La predication aux oiseaux

DISC 8:
Tchaikovsky: Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat minor, Op. 23
Tchaikovsky: Piano Concerto No. 3 in E-flat Major, Op. 75: Allegro brillante
Conductor: Mstislav Rostropovich
Orchestra: National Symphony Orchestra

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Vladimir Feltsman: The Complete Columbia Album Collection
Sony Masterworks Jul 2019
CD
$39.98

Stanford: String Quartets Nos. 1, 2, & 6 / Dante Quartet

SOMM Recordings

$20.99 Jan 17, 2020

SOMM Recordings’ historic complete survey of Charles Villiers Stanford’s String Quartets by the Dante Quartet reaches its end with a third volume focusing on Nos. 1 and 2, and the first recording of No. 6. Already acclaimed as a composer of choral music, Stanford came relatively late to the string quartet form, composing his first two at the age of 39 in 1891. Six more followed over the next three decades, including the Op. 122 String Quartet, No. 6 in 1910. This final volume features the early String Quartets, Opp. 44 (No. 1) and 45 (No. 2) which share a concern for meticulous use of individual instrument voices and a leaning towards lyricism. Allusions to Beethoven and Mozart are contained within Stanford’s own beautifully crafted music. Heard here in its premiere recording, the Sixth String Quartet is a work of rich contrasts, restless energy and some of Stanford’s most expressive writing for the medium. Volume I (SOMMCD 0160) was admired as “an excellent disc in every respect” (MusicWeb International), applauded as “most enterprising and thoroughly likeable” (Classical Ear) and acclaimed “a really worthwhile release” (Gramophone). Volume II (SOMMCD 0185) was described as “essential listening... SOMM and the Dantes have broken important new ground with impressive commitment” by Gramophone and by Limelight as being “played with great élan and sensitivity by the excellent Dante Quartet”.

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REVIEW:

The Dante Quartet play splendidly throughout the album, with noticeably clean articulation and gratifying intonation. Unerringly accomplished, these Dante performances, combined with spirited interpretations that breathe vitality and enthusiasm, would pass the most rigorous examination. The engineering team, recording in St Nicholas Parish Church, Thames Ditton, has provided first class sound quality. Stanford biographer Jeremy Dibble has written the booklet notes. Lovers of British music, and Stanford in particular, need not hesitate in acquiring this superb album.

– MusicWeb International

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Stanford: String Quartets Nos. 1, 2, & 6 / Dante Quartet
SOMM Recordings Jan 2020
CD
$20.99

J. C. Bach: Keyboard Sonatas Op. 5 / Susan Alexander-max

Naxos

$19.99 Mar 29, 2011

These are light, charming pieces. Only one, the sixth and last, spends any time in minor keys, and three of the sonatas consist of two movements each. That said, there are more than a few fully worked out movements, structurally speaking, and the music seems ideally suited to the intimate timbre of the clavichord (sort of like a harpsichord without the sharp “twang”). Susan Alexander-Max plays very well indeed, ornamenting the music liberally but never excessively, and stroking the keys with the kind of sensitivity that produces numerous instances of those dynamic subtleties that made this instrument so popular, despite its evident limitations. She is also very attractively recorded, with an absolute minimum of mechanical noise (some clavichord recordings feature more clicking and squeaking than musical tone). Definitely worth investigating.

-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

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The decision by Naxos to record the six op. 5 sonatas of Johann Christian Bach on the clavichord is a brave one. Even more so than the harpsichord, the clavichord is likely to polarise listeners. In modern parlance its tone might be characterised as 'in-your-face' - neon strip-lighting against the natural daylight of a grand piano.

But one thing the soft action of the clavichord does ensure is a sense of intimacy, which is apt for these almost sensual sonatas. Recording quality here is generally good, despite the fact that the very nature of the mechanics of the clavichord makes its sound rather elusive. Probably for that reason it has been recorded quite closely. At least the church setting coaxes as much resonance out of the instrument as it is willing to give.

Background noise is minimal, except, strangely, in the final Sonata, where there is something very odd going on 'underneath' the recording, as it were. It’s a kind of eerily distorted feedback giving the impression of a neighbour's turned-up television set heard through a wall! Once noticed it is quite distracting, and frankly the producer needs to answer some questions.

Bach published these works in 1766 as Six Sonatas for the Harpsichord or the Fortepiano, Op. 5. These were the very first pieces published in London for the newly emergent piano, and Bach is also credited with the first piano recital in public. According to Susan Alexander-Max's liner-notes, dynamic markings, such as frequent piano and forte, indicate a distinct leaning towards the latter instrument of Bach's title. By this time he was already adopting the new square piano by manufacturers Zumpe as his keyboard instrument of preference. Pianists of the period would nevertheless still often have used a clavichord in the home for composition and practice. That is Alexander-Max's justification for performing these works on the clavichord, a 2006 model based on a 1785 instrument.

Mozart greatly admired Bach's music, and his own early works are clearly influenced by it. In fact, the young Mozart was so taken with Bach's op. 5 that he recomposed nos. 2, 3 and 4 into an early piano concerto, KV.107. The works are generally in three movements, though nos. 1 and 4 are in an old-school two. By this time Bach was well into his cosmopolitan galant period, as these elegant, nuanced works can testify. The opening theme of Sonata no.6 bears a brief but striking resemblance to the famous Russian folksong, "Dark Eyes". By the end of the movement it has morphed into a melancholy Neapolitan-like song of love lost. By this time the bizarre background noise is all too evident.

Alexander-Max's technique is superb on this unforgiving instrument, and she extracts considerable expressiveness from it in the service of Bach's suave, sophisticated music. 74 minutes is a long time to spend listening without a break to the clavichord. In smaller sessions of, say, two sonatas a go, the unique sonorities of this instrument, coupled with the brilliance and imagination of Bach's music, make this an almost irresistible bargain - were it not for the recording quality lapse.

-- Byzantion, MusicWeb International

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J. C. Bach: Keyboard Sonatas Op. 5 / Susan Alexander-max
Naxos Mar 2011
CD
$19.99

Reicha Rediscovered, Vol. 1 / Ilic

Chandos

$21.99 Sep 15, 2017

The Serbian-American Paris-based pianist Ivan Ilic has signed a new multi-album recording contract with Chandos Records, following internationally acclaimed recordings of works by Godowsky and Feldman. His first project on the label is a series devoted to the solo piano works of the Czech composer Antoine Reicha, a contemporary and lifelong friend of Beethoven. Although best known for his contributions to the repertoire for wind quintet, Reicha wrote vast quantities of solo piano music, most of which has never been recorded. The manuscripts, preserved in the Bibliotheque nationale de France, were published only recently. Offering premiere recordings of the Grande Sonate in C major, the Sonata in F major, and three excerpts from Practische Beispiele, this first volume confirms Reicha as an authoritative, singular voice, whose piano works complement and enrich our understnanding of Haydn and Beethoven. Volume 1 is a coproduction of Chandos, RTS (Swiss Radio), and the Palazzetto Bru Zane- Centre de Musique Romantique Francaise in Venice.

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Reicha Rediscovered, Vol. 1 / Ilic
Chandos Sep 2017
CD
$21.99

Franck & Brahms: Cello Sonatas
Channel Classics Jan 2002
SACD
$21.99

Brahms: Works for Solo Piano, Vol. 4 / Douglas

Chandos

$21.99 May 26, 2015

Vol. 4 in Barry Douglas’s monumental, well-regarded solo piano Brahms project prominently features the composer’s first published work, his C major Sonata, op. 1.The influence on Brahms of his predecessors Beethoven and Schubert is obvious, not only in the virtuoso demands on the performer but also in the opening, which recalls both Beethoven’s ‘Hammerklavier’ Sonata and Schubert’s ‘Wanderer’ Fantasy.Two other impeccable and impressive works, the Schumann Variations, op. 9, and the Paganini Variations, Op. 35 (Book 1) are included, along with several short keyboard character pieces.

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Brahms: Works for Solo Piano, Vol. 4 / Douglas
Chandos May 2015
CD
$21.99

Piano Masterpieces

DUX

$19.99 Jan 30, 2026

This album features three masterpieces by composers deeply connected to Vienna, two of whom-Haydn and Beethoven-earned the timeless title of "Viennese Classics," while Schubert, ever the bold innovator, explored new musical territories in their shadow. Created within less than fifty years, these works reveal the evolution of the piano sonata genre and the eventual rejection of it's conventional form-from Haydn's Sonata in E Major, which straddles the line between the galant style and fully developed classicism, to Schubert's avant-garde and extravagantly Romantic Fantasy in C Major, a work far ahead of it's time. Schubert's innovation would not have been possible without Beethoven's influence. Beethoven's late-period Sonata in E Major, written just two years earlier, serves as a bridge between the two, clearly paving the way toward a pre-Romantic expressive style. Mariusz Ciolko, an internationally performing artist, pedagogue, and competition juror, brings a unique interpretation to this demanding piano repertoire. He masterfully balances classical elegance with Romantic virtuosity, offering a performance that captures both the technical brilliance and emotional depth of these iconic works.

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Piano Masterpieces
DUX Jan 2026
CD
$19.99

Mix & Match

Tribute to Paul Badura-Skoda

Gramola Records

$24.99 Jun 20, 2025

Native from Naples, Italy, pianist Lorenzo Pone lives in Salzburg and is one of the most highly acclaimed young pianists today. Having been a student of Paul Badura-Skoda's for almost a decade, he dedicates his debut album "Tribute to Paul Badura-Skoda" to this great master. Universally praised for the distinctive quality of his sound and his formidable perfectionism, Pone presents among others piano sonatas which he worked on with Badura-Skoda during the last weeks of the latter's life in 2019, among them the Sonata No. 51 by Joseph Haydn, the Grand Sonata No. 26 in A-flat major by Ludwig van Beethoven, the Piano Sonata Op. 1 No. 10 by Lodovico Giustini and the Three Nocturnes Op. 15 by Frederic Chopin. The program, which is derived from a piano recital given at the Teatro di San Carlo of Naples in honor of Badura-Skoda in October, 2019, closes off with three pieces of Claude Debussy's Preludes: Minstrels, La fille aux cheveux de lin and La Puerta del Vino.

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Tribute to Paul Badura-Skoda
Gramola Records Jun 2025
CD
$24.99

DISCOVERED TAPES - SONATAS

Rhine Classics

$53.99 Aug 09, 2019

From 1947 to 1956 Ruggiero Ricci played on the 1734 Guarneri del Gesu "Ferni, Duc de Camposelice" and from 1956 to 1999 he usually played on the 1731 Guarneri del Gesu "Gibson, ex-Huberman, " which he purchased in 1977. For him the Guarneri sound (as opposed to Stradivari) was a matter of preference, able as it was to give the required brilliance, color and attack that he sought. Until 1981 he also owned violin Lorenzo Storioni c. 1779, with which he recorded the 6 Bach Solos on February 27-28, 1981. This 4-album set presents live and studio recordings, ranging from 1952 to 1986, including some rarities which have never been released commercially, like the Bartok Romanian Folk Dances, Bloch Violin Sonata No. 1, Prokofiev Violin Sonata No. 1, and Saint-Saens Violin Sonata No. 1 Op. 75.

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DISCOVERED TAPES - SONATAS
Rhine Classics Aug 2019
CD
$53.99

Beethoven: Complete Works for Cello & Piano, Vol. 1 / Schwabe, Rimmer

Naxos

$13.99 ~~$19.99~~ Save 30% Sep 13, 2024

Beethoven's Sonatas for Piano and Cello, Op. 5 are revolutionary works, with neither instrument subservient and the piano fully independent. This release also features his vivacious variations on 'Ein Madchen oder Weibchen' and 'Bei Mannern, welche Liebe fu¨hlen' from Mozart's Die Zauberflote. Volume 2 is scheduled for release on 8.574530 in November.

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Beethoven: Complete Works for Cello & Piano, Vol. 1 / Schwabe, Rimmer
Naxos Sep 2024
CD
~~$19.99~~ $13.99

Vitali: Varie Sonate alla Francese e all'Itagliana a Sei Str

Tactus

$21.99 Jun 05, 2020

The city of Modena, under the rule of the Este family, was the capital of the Dukedom of Modena e Reggio. Thanks to Duke Francesco II's fondness for the violin, music became an essential element in the most important events at the Este court, such as receptions, weddings and official visits of foreign sovereigns. These were the occasions in which the Duke displayed all his magnificence. Modena stands out for the abundance of it's collection of musical documents in the Biblioteca Estense: the library is a real mine, largely unexplored so far. This consideration gave rise to the idea of making this beautiful, extraordinarily modern music available to those who are "pursuing" culture and art. So our goal is to promote a rediscovery of the enormous heritage preserved in the Biblioteca Estense, by carrying out a meticulous study of the sources of the works of the composers who were active at the Este Court in Modena, transcribing them into modern notation and critical editions, and producing monographic recordings of them. The first step consisted in the study and recording of the instrumental works of Giovanni Battista Vitali. In this fifth of 6 releases dedicated to his music preserved at the Estense Library of Modena, the baroque ensemble Italico Splendore performs the Sonatas for six instruments Op. 11, published in Modena in 1684. These are dance movements grouped by tone in the typical manner of a suite, in a sophisticated blend of Italian and French styles.

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Vitali: Varie Sonate alla Francese e all'Itagliana a Sei Str
Tactus Jun 2020
CD
$21.99

Beethoven: Piano Sonatas

Supraphon

$41.99 Jul 06, 2018

Launching his Mozart debut recorded with the Czech Philharmonic and Jirí Belohlávek, Jan Bartoš drew to himself a lot of critical attention on an international scale. Those who reviewed the album especially appreciated his rare ability to combine thorough understanding both of the musical architecture and the deep emotionality of the works (a quality possessed also by the pianist's tutors Ivan Moravec and Alfred Brendel). From the early "Haydn-like" Sonata No. 3 in C major to the highly dramatic "Appassionata" to the transcendent last Sonata No. 32 in C minor, which gives an impression of the composer parting with this world, the pianist facilitates to us the amazing integrity and colorfulness of Beethoven's piano work. During the thirty years separating his first and last piano opus, the composer tried out numberless experiments, and yet some crucial themes come up again and again; the imprint of his unique musical DNA is discernible from his very first opuses. In the hands of Jan Bartoš, Beethoven whispers, sings and thunders. We encounter a world full of contrasts, an image whose colors remain impressed in our memory for a long time.

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Beethoven: Piano Sonatas
Supraphon Jul 2018
CD
$41.99

Scarlatti: Sonatas (Arranged For Accordion) / Janne Rattya

Ondine

$18.99 Feb 25, 2014

D. SCARLATTI Harpsichord Sonatas • Janne Rättyä (acc) • ONDINE 1232-2 (57:10)

After a couple of generic paragraphs about the music, mixing the usual, uninformative clichés with some eyebrow-raising opinions (“Scarlatti introduces a veritable history of Spanish music into his style and enables sonic invention to blossom from the dry soil of the harpsichord....”), the liner notes finally deal briefly with the question that might interest anyone curious about this album: why an accordion? The answer does not satisfy: “The nuanced attention to sonic shape at every moment of the melody, figure or gesture ... the stunning range of color....”

The accordion is a keyboard-based wind instrument. Its range of color is based on stops. If you’re looking for nuance and color, the piano is far better at it, because dynamics can be applied individually to each note. Dynamics on an accordion apply to all notes across the board at any given time by varying the degree of air pumped through the bellows. It’s safer to say what the liner notes in all their vague effusiveness never point out, that Janne Rättyä is an excellent classical accordionist who has collaborated with a host of modern composers, and understandably wants to claim some Baroque territory for his instrument as well.

How does this work out in practice? Rättyä is careful to select music that plays to the strengths of his instrument. The F-Minor Sonata, K 386, features lively two-part counterpoint, and the accordionist is an agile technician. He also plays several slower works, such as the well-known Sonata in C Minor, K 11, where a guitar-like, single-note melody is played in the right hand. This allows him a degree of freedom with dynamics, and also reveals his sensitivity in phrasing. He shows himself of much of the same mind as harpsichordist Richard Lester, with his flexible, folk-inflected tempos, rather than more Italianate performances in Scarlatti’s keyboard music that emphasize consistent rhythms. Some of the moderate tempo pieces benefit from a similar treatment. The E-Major Sonata, K 135, sounds very playful here, without losing its forward pulse, and the pastoral-like G-Major Sonata, K 13, is picked out with grace.

I find matters less successful when Rättyä tries to push beyond these boundaries. The popular F Minor Sonata, K 519, and D-Minor Sonata, K 52, are muddy in their bass voicings, because the instrument’s rounder tone blends the notes of the chords rather than allowing them to stand out distinctly. But in general, the album hews to the plan laid out above: faster, two-part counterpoint pieces, and slower ones with a simple single-note melody in the right hand. This makes for a certain monotony, since there’s far more to Scarlatti than that, but a few selections at a time make for attractive listening. Up to you.

FANFARE: Barry Brenesal

The truth is that Rättyä does some amazing things from a purely mechanical point of view: some of the quicker sonatas, such as K.386 in F Minor, have seldom been played more accurately on any instrument, and the accordion’s near total absence of resonance makes it impossible for the player to hide. You just have to keep going. It’s like getting stuck on a roller coster. In slower, more emotionally affecting music the instrument frankly sounds silly. Strike that–it sounds silly everywhere, but give Rättyä credit for taking this project completely seriously and doing everything that he can with the limited resources that he’s stuck with. He even arranges the sonatas into quasi-scholarly groups by key, although he’s limited to C, F, E, G and D (major and minor). The sonics are terrific."

-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

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Scarlatti: Sonatas (Arranged For Accordion) / Janne Rattya
Ondine Feb 2014
CD
$18.99

Fantasia - Mozart on the Organ

Brilliant Classics

$9.99 ~~$12.99~~ Save 25% Feb 07, 2025

A unique take on Mozart's music from the organ loft. Mozart wrote sparingly for the solo organ - a relatively early collection of short Epistle Sonatas for liturgical use, and later on a few more individual pieces for a new mechanical organ. In neither case was he using the full extent of a large instrument as exploited by his Baroque predecessors. At the same time, Mozart himself was no stranger to the organ loft; he would have been regularly playing the instrument at St Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna had his plans come to fruition and he had lived long enough to attain the post of Director of Music there. Manuel Tomadin has imaginatively filled in this gap in the Mozart catalogue, as it were, with his own transcriptions of pieces particularly well suited to the soundworld of the organ. The A minor Sonata K310 shares a surging, Sturm und Drang sensibility with the two fantasias, in C minor and D minor. In turn this character lends itself to the Gothic grandeur of the 'king of instruments', when sensitively registered and nimbly executed. The coloristic possibilities of the organ, it's dynamic range and effects of perspective, are also put to dramatic use in bringing to life two of Mozart's opera overtures, from Cosi fan tutte and Die Zauberflote. Tomadin does not neglect the roots of Mozart's music in the Baroque, with a transcription of the rococo G major sonata K283 which he wrote at the age of 18, plus a much less familiar Preludio and Capriccio in C K394. In both of these pieces, Mozart was drawing on the legacy of CPE Bach, who had given him lessons as a child - a period to which Tomadin pays tribute with another rarity, one of the 'London Sketches' preserved in notebook form from the family's stay in the English capital. Tomadin has chosen an original and historically appropriate instrument for this fascinating exploration of Mozart on the organ, built in the late 1780s by the Montesanti firm for the parish church of Governolo in the province of Lombardy. The booklet includes a full specification of the organ, plus Tomadin's own introduction to the repertoire and his approach to it as a transcriber and performer. - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) had a profound connection with the church organ, an instrument that played a significant role in his musical development. As a child prodigy, Mozart was exposed to the organ in church settings, where he often performed. The organ's grandeur and complexity influenced his compositional style, particularly in his sacred music. - Although Mozart called it "The King of instruments" he wrote comparatively few works for the organ. Organist Manuel Tomadin professes his love for the composer and his considerable skill as an organist by transcribing several works for the organ: the overtures Cosi fan tutte and Die Zauberflote, two piano sonatas K 283 and 310, and several small keyboard works, perfectly suited for performance on the organ. - Played on a historical instrument: the 1788-1790 Andrea & Luigi Montesanti organ of the Parish Church of Governolo, Italy. - A feast of colours and timbres, celebrating the genius of Mozart's eternal music!

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Fantasia - Mozart on the Organ
Brilliant Classics Feb 2025
CD
~~$12.99~~ $9.99

Leon McCawley: Piano Recital

SOMM Recordings

$20.99 Apr 30, 2026

SOMM Recordings continues it's long collaboration with pianist Leon McCawley, named "one of today's most impeccably musical pianists" by International Piano. His past recordings for SOMM include much-admired releases of piano music by Chopin; Barber (Critics' Choice in Gramophone); Brahms (Classic FM CD of the Week); Schumann; Rachmaninoff Complete Preludes; Haydn Sonatas and Variations (awarded a Diapason d'Or); Schubert; three further volumes of Haydn Sonatas; and the 2024 release Natural Connection, about which Gramophone wrote: "This scintillatingly varied recital combines sensuous virtuosity, compelling charm and musical probity. Highly recommended." In this recital McCawley presents some of his old favourites by composer-pianists Liszt, Beethoven, Chopin, and Franck. While the recital focuses on 19th century composers, the programme begins and ends with a nod to J.S. Bach. Among Bach's works that Franz Liszt revered were his six organ preludes and fugues. In transcribing them for piano, Liszt became a major influence on later arrangers. Heard here is the first in the set, Prelude and Fugue in A minor. The Piano Sonata in C major, Op. 53, "The Waldstein," by Beethoven-dedicated to his friend and patron, Count Ferdinand von Waldstein-comes from his aptly named "Heroic" period. It was written in 1804, two years after the watershed moment of his Heiligenstadt Testament, when he had contemplated suicide because of his encroaching deafness, but instead made the profound choice to channel his despair into a bold new musical style. The "Waldstein" Sonata is a vivid expression of this newfound path and of Beethoven's ability to transcend personal adversity to create ground-breaking works of deep complexity. One of the renowned "out-takes" of musical history is Beethoven's Andante favori. He originally intended it as the slow movement of his "Waldstein" Sonata, but he substituted it with a shorter adagio labelled "Introduzione." He had formed an attachment to the piece, though, and he published it as a stand-alone work, including it frequently in subsequent recitals. In an engaging piece of programming, Leon McCawley pairs it here with the "Waldstein" Sonata. Two introspective works by Chopin follow. The Berceuse is a series of continuous contemplations on a simple, nocturne-like theme. In the Barcarolle, Chopin's affinity to the bel canto operatic style is strongly apparent, especially in the beautiful, florid figurations in the right hand. Leon McCawley closes his beautifully curated recital with the Prélude, Choral et Fugue for solo piano by César Franck. Franck was trained as a pianist, but he served as an organist at Paris's Sainte-Clotilde Church from 1858 until his death in 1890. Inspired by the rich, orchestral sound of the Cavaillé-Coll organ there, he developed a grandiose, improvisatory style of keyboard writing that was harmonically influenced by Bach but thoroughly romantic in expression.

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Leon McCawley: Piano Recital
SOMM Recordings Apr 2026
CD
$20.99

Mix & Match

Britten, Prokofiev & Shostakovich: The Cello Sonatas

Orfeo

$20.99 Apr 14, 2015

This new CD by Daniel Müller-Schott and Francesco Piemontesi offers three sonatas for cello and piano, works that sum up several chapters of 20th c. history that go far beyond the merely musical. Sergei Prokofiev displays a masterly serenity in his songlike Sonata in C, op. 119, composed in 1949. It makes evident his adjustment to the cultural politics of the Soviet Union – to which this world-famous composer had returned just twelve years before – but is also tailor-made for an exceptional cello-piano duo. Dmitri Shostakovich’s Sonata in d minor, op. 40 is no less marked by fate. It was on the program of a concert tour given by the composer and his cello partner Viktor Kubatsky in 1936 when Shostakovich was put on the Stalinist index of undesirables, on orders from the very top. Finally, Benjamin Britten’s Sonata in C, op. 65 marked the beginning of a productive, creative friendship with Rostropovich that was established, despite many a problem posed by the Cold War, in Aldeburgh in 1961 when performed by the composer and Rostropovich.

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Britten, Prokofiev & Shostakovich: The Cello Sonatas
Orfeo Apr 2015
CD
$20.99

Bland: Piano Sonatas, Vol. 3

Bridge Records

$16.99 Feb 07, 2025

The previous volumes of William Bland's piano sonata cycle have met with ecstatic praise from the international press. American critic Ken Meltzer writes: "Compelling music, superbly performed. A marvelous presentation of the Romantic piano in full flight." And from British critic Colin Clarke: "The range of expressive tools is vast. It's grand music, with grand playing from Kevin Gorman. It is fervently to be hoped that this series continues." The Atlanta Audio Society wrote of Vol. 2: "In the last analysis, this is one of the best new piano recordings of the year." The brilliant 30-year old American pianist Kevin Gorman's new recording presents premieres of two sonatas: No. 6 in c minor, Bestiary - con Amore (2001) and No. 15 in e-flat minor (2004).

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Bland: Piano Sonatas, Vol. 3
Bridge Records Feb 2025
CD
$16.99

Devienne, Donizetti, Beethoven, Morlacchi-Torriani: Bassoon Trios / Data, Carbotta, Barbareschi

Brilliant Classics

$13.99 Apr 29, 2016

This album presents the bassoon used in duo and trio arrangements, and centers around the often-neglected Bassoon Trio WoO37 by Beethoven. Along with Beethoven’s bassoon trio, this release also features Devienne’s Sonata in C for flute and bassoon, Donizetti’s Trio in F for flute, bassoon and piano, and Morlacchi’sDuetto concertato for flute, bassoon and piano on the motif of Maestro Verdi. Performing these works are Italian soloists Massimo Data, Mario Carbotta, and Piero Barbareschi.

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Devienne, Donizetti, Beethoven, Morlacchi-Torriani: Bassoon Trios / Data, Carbotta, Barbareschi
Brilliant Classics Apr 2016
CD
$13.99

Martines: The Complete Keyboard Works

Signum Classics

$32.99 Apr 17, 2026

Martines: The Complete Keyboard Works presents the first complete modern recording of the surviving keyboard music of Marianna Martines (1744-1812), a composer, keyboard virtuoso, and cultural force in eighteenth-century Viennese musical life. Admired in her lifetime for her brilliance as both performer and composer, Martines occupied a central position within the city's elite musical circles, yet her instrumental music has remained largely absent from the recorded canon. Led by conductor Cayenna Ponchione-Bailey, with pianist Idith Meshulam Korman and the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra, this release brings together Martines's four surviving keyboard concertos, three sonatas, and her Sinfonia in C major, recorded from newly prepared critical editions. The works reveal a composer writing ambitiously for public performance, combining lyrical vocal writing with striking technical demands, orchestral imagination, and playful formal subversion. Conceived as a major interpretative and restorative project, this release restores Martines's keyboard music to the Classical canon as a vital and compelling body of work.

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Martines: The Complete Keyboard Works
Signum Classics Apr 2026
CD
$32.99

Apassionato: Beethoven / Donka Angatschewa

Ars Produktion

SACD

$21.99 Mar 25, 2016

Donka Angatschewa presents this album of Beethoven’s solo piano works. This recording features Beethoven’s Appassionata, Op. 57, 11 Bagatellen, Op. 119, Sonata, Op. 90, and Rondo a capriccio, Op. 129. Donka Angatcheva debuted with the Plovdiv Philharmonic Orchestra when she was only ten years old. She has won numerous awards at international piano competitions, and frequently performs internationally.

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Apassionato: Beethoven / Donka Angatschewa
Ars Produktion Mar 2016
SACD
$21.99

G.F. Couperin: Sonatas, Variations & Rondo / Pierini

Brilliant Classics

$9.99 ~~$12.99~~ Save 25% Sep 06, 2024

This first recording of a selection of Gervais-Francois Couperin's keyboard works aims to give an overview of the youngest member of the Couperin family with works that have survived to the present day. The son of Armand-Louis Couperin (1727-1789), to whom Brilliant Records has also dedicated a release featuring his complete harpsichord works (see BC 95459), G.-F. Couperin (1759-1826) is the last known musician in the line of the greatest French musical dynasty of it's time. The selection of pieces presented here is meant to demonstrate his compositional exploration of the fortepiano. The four most employed forms in Couperin's keyboard oeuvre are the variations, the sonata, the rondo, and the piece in free form. This programme features the most important examples of these four types. The Two Sonatas Op.1, issued in 1788, were most probably intended to officially present the young composer to the French connoisseurs. They were conceived pour le clavecin ou forte-piano, with accompaniment of violin and cello ad libitum. Both sonatas consist of three movements, the first one in a large sonata form. A slower movement follows, the one in the second sonata consisting of a theme with 7 variations. A final movement in rondo form closes both sonatas. Stylistically, they are relatively close to other sonatas of the time, although they feature quasi-symphonic writing in the first movements. The highly virtuosic style exemplified in the two Sonatas Op.1 becomes even more evident in two single pieces, strictly related to one another: Les Incroyables Op.6 and Les Merveilleuses Op.7. The two pieces refer to adherents of a fashion trend highly favoured by the aristocracy in Paris during the French Directory (1795-99). The men were called Incroyables ("incredible") and the women Merveilleuses ("marvelous"), and they greeted the new regime with an outbreak of luxury, decadence, even silliness, perhaps as a reaction to the Terror period. The two pieces are in free form, with a ritornello in the first, shorter part. However, this form actually owes much to the rondo, which Couperin had already proved to master, both in his sonatas and in a short individual Rondo presented here, published in the Journal de Clavecin in 1782. This short and elegant piece, which may possibly be the first piece ever published by Couperin, is the closest one to the classical period, with it's almost-Viennese flavour. Two sets of variations both published in 1790, together with the slow movement of the Sonata Op.1 No.2, show Couperin's adeptness with this genre. It is worth noting that while the first set is based on one of the most emblematic of Revolutionary songs, 'Ah! Ca ira', the second is based on a royalist song, the Complainte bearnoise, a troubadour's protestations at King Louis XVI being housed in the Palais de Tuileries at the beginning of the revolution. Other information: - Recorded September 2023, Monte Compatri, Italy - Booklet in English contains liner notes by the artist, as well as his biography - Simone PIerini plays an original fortepiano by J. Haselmann (c.1800-10), tuned to A=430 Hz in the Young 1 temperament (1800) - This premiere recording of a selection of Gervais-Francois Couperin's works aims to give an overview of the latest member of the Couperin family whose works has survived to the present day. Son of Armand-Louis Couperin (1727-1789), Gervais-Francois Couperin (1759-1826) was the latest known musician of the greatest French musical dynasty of the time. He was a highly esteemed composer and musician, who played for Napoleon, and was organist of several important Churches in Paris (Saint-Gervais, St. Sulpice and others). - The four most employed forms in Couperin's keyboard oeuvre are the variations, the sonata, the rondo, and the piece in free form, each of which is represented in this new recording. The highly virtuosic style of the two sonatas Op.1 becomes even evident in Les Incroyables Op.6, and Les Merveilleuses Op.7. The two pieces refer to the followers of a fashion highly favoured by the aristocracy in Paris during the French Directory (1795-1799). The followers of this new fashion, the Incroyables (i. e., the "incredibles") as concerns men, the Merveilleuses (the "marvelous women") for the women, greeted the new regime with an outbreak of luxury, decadence, and even silliness. - Played on the fortepiano by Simone Pierini Born in Rome in 1996, Pierini began studying music at the age of eight. Aged eighteen, he graduated in piano at S. Cecilia Conservatory of Music, Rome, with highest honors. He afterwards grew interest in historically informed piano practice, attending masterclasses led by Alexei Lubimov, Andreas Staier, Tobias Koch, Stefano Fiuzzi. Subsequently, his interest about historical keyboards in general grew further, and he began studying harpsichord and basso continuo with such teachers as Andrea Coen and Giovanni Togni. His recordings with music by Cherubini and the complete piano sonatas by Helene de Montgeroult were very positively received by the press. Classic FM nominated him as one of the 30 best musicians under 30 in 2024.

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G.F. Couperin: Sonatas, Variations & Rondo / Pierini
Brilliant Classics Sep 2024
CD
~~$12.99~~ $9.99

Complete Works for Viola, Vol. 1

Challenge Classics

$12.99 ~~$16.99~~ Save 25% Sep 05, 2025

First volume of a complete survey of Brahms' music with viola. It includes the Sonatas op.120 anf the Trio op.40. There is a special connection between Brahms's musical world and the sonority of the viola. Acclaimed and experienced violist Mikhail Zemtsov can count on the collaboration of two distinguished soloists as Hanna Shybayeva and Daniel Rowland. A version of Brahms' chamber music masterpieces infused with Russian ardour and drive.

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Complete Works for Viola, Vol. 1
Challenge Classics Sep 2025
CD
~~$16.99~~ $12.99