Sunday 11 April 2010

I did not recall having heard Ottorino Respighi's 1917 sonata for violin & piano, even though I have recordings of it by Heifetz, Politkovsky and Shumsky. It's a work with many attractive moments and lasts for 27 minutes in its latest re-incarnation by Frederieke Saeijs and Maurice Lammerts van Bueren. The works sounds like something by Guillaume Lekeu crossed with Richard Strauss, with a dose of Nikolai Medtner. The well-played and recorded Naxos CD also contains Ravel's somewhat hackneyed violin & piano sonata, plus a nondescript sonata by Enrique Granados (that sounds like anything but Granados).

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