Tchaikovsky: Piano Sonata in G; Romanze; Aveu Passionné; Scharwenka: Sonata No 2; Im Freien (exc)

Tchaikovsky's sole mature piano sonata is as over the top as romantic sonatas come. The first movement is a noise fest of volubility and excitability, and it's only in the slow movement that the mood of fevered obsessiveness lifts even partially. German pianist Joseph Moog here pairs it with another sonata from the 1870s, by Xaver Scharwenka, full-blooded but not as excessively ardent as the Tchaikovsky. Moog has the technique to capture the grandeur the two composers had in mind, though he doesn't quite manage the sweep that, say, Sviatoslav Richter achieved in the Tchaikovsky, or the pioneering Seta Tanyel, in her Scharwenka revival in the 1990s. The shorter pieces are nicely done. url.ie/dzi7