CLASSICAL

Latest releases reviewed

TCHAIKOVSKY: VIOLIN CONCERTO; KORNGOLD: VIOLIN CONCERTO
Anne-Sophie Mutter (violin), Vienna Philharmonic, London Symphony/ André Previn Deutsche Grammophon 474 8742 (CD/SACD Hybrid)
***

I'm an artist of extremes, explains Anne-Sophie Mutter, "who loves using the unlimited colours a violin has to offer. As a listener, you either love it or hate it, but I believe that music should never leave people untouched." And she attributes the changes in her approach to the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto on disc to her encounters with contemporary music. That's the Mutter style - to throw everything in her arsenal at everything she plays. It's a highly arresting approach, a kind of ongoing diary which acts as a personal testament to the current peak of the art of violin playing. As music-making it's more variable, frequently distracting in the Viennese concert recording of the Tchaikovsky, often magically improvisatory in a London studio in the mid 20th-century romantic sweetness of the Korngold. www.dgclassics.com

Michael Dervan

BIBER: THE ROSARY SONATAS
Andrew Manze (violin), Richard Egarr (organ, harpsichord) Harmonia Mundi HMU 902321.22 (2 CDs)
***

English baroque violinist Andrew Manze has a reputation for playing of rich exuberance and fantasy. Yet his approach to Biber's set of 15 Rosary (or Mystery) Sonatas is smooth and soulful, integrating the often virtuosic turns of the violin writing into long-arched lines. The continuo is restrained, too, to just harpsichord or organ (cello is added for a single sonata). It all makes this one of the most ascetic-sounding of recent recordings of these remarkable 17th-century works, which make copious use of the musical effects opened up by the retuning of the strings known as scordatura. Something is gained and something is lost by the tightness of focus in this recording by an artist who knows how to surprise in the most surprising of ways. www.harmoniamundi.com

Michael Dervan

THE EARLY BBC RECORDINGS 1961-1965
Jacqueline Du Pré (cello) EMI Classics 586 2362 (2 CDs)
***

Jacqueline Du Pré (1945-87) remains such a much-loved artist it is almost surprising to recall that her career scarcely lasted more than a decade, and she stopped recording in 1971. These BBC recordings from her earliest years include Bach's First and Second Cello Suites, Brahms's F major Cello Sonata (with Stephen Kovacevich), Couperin (with her teacher, William Pleeth), and arrangements of Falla and Handel with Ernest Lush. As a performer she was generous to a fault, barely able to contain her expressive eagerness. Yet the ardency of her youth seems less wilful than it sometimes later became. www.emiclassics.com

Michael Dervan