After two hearings, I am highly impressed with Sergei Khachatryan playing the first Shostakovich violin concerto (Prom, 29 July). Yet another phenomenal violinist! Of course, the playing is impeccable. But there is an extraordinary absence of striving for effect or of point making, a total immersion in the music, a wide variety of vibrato, a dynamic range from pp to ff based on musical sense, a willingness to observe rests (viz, the cadenza to the Shostakovich concerto). The huge Albert Hall is pretty silent as if the audience were mesmerised (which it probably was). The control (and audience lack of even breathing) is also really noticeable in the Andante from the Bach second unaccompanied sonata played as an encore.
I was alerted to Khachatryan being something special by the off-air recording of the Beethoven violin concerto (sent to me by Akiko). But this Shostakovich really suggest that we have a violinist even "better" than Jansen, Fischer, Batiashvili, Repin ... or all the others. Superb! This really is a golden age of young violinists.