Britten's Violin Concerto

For decades Benjamin Britten's violin concerto lurked in the musical shadows and was rarely heard. Partly I suspect this was due to a certain distaste surrounding Britten the man; partly critical scorn at someone daring to write a concerto in D minor with tunes, themes and melodies … in 1939. I came across the concerto relatively late in my life but I now own no less than fourteen versions played by a broad swathe of violinists: James Ehnes (x2), Bronislav Gimpel, Daniel Hope, Janine Jansen (x2), Mark Lubotsky (with Britten), Rebecca Hirsch, Lorraine McAslan, Anthony Marwood, Theo Olof (the original version in 1948 before Britten revised it) and Frank Peter Zimmermann (x3). On order is a version with Maxim Vengerov (for which I do not hold out great expectations, but it comes as part of a box).

I have just been listening to Frank Peter Zimmermann in this work (recorded in 2004 with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Manfred Honeck). Zimmermann is my kind of violinist, and the Britten work suits him down to the ground. He plays with passionate conviction (the kind of passion I missed with James Ehnes) and his sophisticated violin sound suits this multi-layered music. We do not need the rich, dark Juilliard / DeLay sound in this music (which is one reason I suspect Vengerov will prove a dud for me). Somewhat to my surprise, the Swedish Radio Orchestra makes a very real contribution, playing Britten's sweeping melodies as if it were their favourite work. A big hit, then, and Zimmermann may even trump Janine Jansen, the reigning favourite.

Also on the Zimmermann CD are the two violin concertos of Karol Szymanowski. I have struggled to like these concertos for decades; at one time I even bought the violin music so I could try it out myself (some hope). But both concertos, in the end, remain somewhat elusive, and while I can bask in the general orchestral wash, I cannot really get involved with Szymanowski's music. My loss, I suspect. I'll go on persevering (but not on my violin).

Bach and Handel

From Eisenach, where Johann Sebastian Bach was born in 1685, to Halle where Georg Friedrich Händel (as he then was) was born in the same year, is only around 170 kilometres as the crow flies; when I drove from one to the other a couple of years ago, it took around two hours. Their music is as different as chalk and cheese, with Handel embracing the new, Italianate style of uncluttered melody and accompaniment and Bach looking backwards to a world of complex polyphony. I find it remarkable that two such people could have been born in the same area within six weeks of each other (Handel was the elder, and he and Bach had quite different adult lives and never met) and that, 328 years after their births, their music is still alive, well, popular and played regularly all over the world.

I grew up with the music of Bach and Handel and have a large collection of recordings (and violin music) of both. This evening I put on a 1990 recording (Philippe Herreweghe) of three Bach cantatas. It is music that is simply eternal, and completely satisfying. It is rich, it is varied, it announces from the very first notes that a great composer is at the helm. Both Bach and Handel were prolific composers (they had to be to earn money to make ends meet). We are all lucky to have such a treasure house of great music; I confidently predict that, in 328 years time, my successors will still be listening to Bach cantatas and Handel operas with enormous satisfaction.

Mikhail Simonyan, and Catherine Manoukian

My generous friend Lee sent me a CD of the Khachaturian Violin Concerto as a birthday present. Very kind of him, and one must not look a birthday horse in the mouth, so I listened with interest. Violinist is Mikhail Simonyan (an Armenian) and this is his first commercial CD. Orchestra is the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Kristjan Järvi and, from the sound of it, the orchestra does not have many Armenian members; very polite and accurate, very British, and a long way from the frenetic Romanian Radio Orchestra directed by a wild Niyazi (for Julian Sitkovetsky). I found the orchestra under Järvi a little too interventionist for my liking (in this particular concerto).

The Khachaturian is a young person's concerto and pays dividends to a player who throws himself or herself into the music, with gusto. Simonyan is just the man; right from the start, his staccato playing stands out as incredible – Heifetz's jaw would have dropped. Like too many young players, he spoils the first movement a little by stamping on the brakes hard whenever a nice lyrical tune appears. He commissioned a new cadenza for the first movement (what was wrong with the old one?) and it goes on and on and on, becoming almost a new movement in itself. Black mark; cadenzas should be spectacular – and brief. The slow movement (andante) is a bit slow, but superbly played by the violinist, with a real ability to hold a long, melodic line. The finale brings back the stunning staccato playing and confirms Simonyan as a truly spectacular violinist. A pity about that cadenza, which should have been on a separate track so it could be skipped on future hearings. Bizarre or inappropriate cadenzas appear to be all the rage nowadays, as violinists and pianists try desperately to differentiate themselves from the last player with a Unique Selling Point (usp).

In for a penny; in for a pound, so I immediately dived into an alternative version with an Armenian by origin, Canadian by birth – Catherine Manoukian – with the Armenian Philharmonic conducted by Eduard Topchjan. The Armenian Philharmonic sounds less British than the LSO; no bad thing in Khachaturian. Some enthusiastic cymbal playing throughout. Manoukian lacks Simonyan's go-for-broke enthusiasm, and her playing is far more meditative – a warm evening in Yerevan. And she does not have Simonyan's spectacular staccato (but who does?) Coming immediately after Simonyan, she sounds almost careful in her playing, but that is down in the end simply to a contrast in approaches. Her first movement cadenza ain't short, either. A lovely, meditative slow movement and a well-judged finale.

As usual, it's swings and roundabouts. With Simonyan you get some really exciting violin playing with a staccato to die for. But you also get a somewhat unidiomatic orchestra and conductor, and that long first movement cadenza. With Manoukian you get some lovely playing and an orchestra that obviously knows and relishes the music. With Simonyan, you come away full of admiration for the violin playing. With Manoukian, you come away with admiration for Aram Khachaturian. Obviously, I'll have to keep both versions near to hand. Life is never simple.

Seven Violin Concertos. And James Ehnes

The nine years 1938-47 witnessed the birth of no fewer than seven violin concertos that are still – 70 years on – being played and recorded. Quite a phenomenon for a turbulent period. The seven concertos are by Nikolai Myaskovsky (1938), Béla Bartok (1938), Benjamin Britten (1939), William Walton (1939), Aram Khachaturian (1940), Erich Korngold (1945) and Dmitri Shostakovich (1947). Seven concertos in nine years!

Not that they all swept to instant fame, of course. At that period, the world was somewhat busy with everyone fighting each other. And music with themes, tunes and melodies attracted ugly scowls from the musical establishment, still advocating serialism and atonality. Seventy years on, however, the seven have gained a fair degree of acceptance. The lovely Myaskovsky concerto is still something of a rarity, despite it having been championed by Vadim Repin, amongst others (Repin's recording of the work with Valery Gergiev is a real classic). The first Shostakovich concerto has entered the ranks of much-played and much-recorded works. Personally, I am not too interested in the Walton concerto, which seems to me to be clever rather than deeply felt. I can get through the Bartok, but he is not my kind of composer.

The Britten concerto has sprung into prominence over the past few years; I have just acquired a new recording of the work by James Ehnes (who has often performed it) and tomorrow will see the delivery of yet another new recording, this time from Frank Peter Zimmermann (who has also performed it frequently). The Ehnes is coupled with the first Shostakovich concerto; the Zimmermann will feature the two violin concertos by Szymanowski – another non-serial composer from the 1930s.

The new Ehnes CD is superb; the orchestra is the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra under Kirill Karabits. Ehnes tackles both the Britten and Shostakovich with aplomb, with breath-taking accuracy and immaculate taste. For anyone who likes these two not dissimilar concertos, this CD is a perfect gift. If I have to confess to a slight hesitation when faced with well-near perfection, it is that Ehnes rarely shows much personal or emotional involvement (a quality extremely difficult to define). But Janine Jansen in the Britten, and Leila Josefowicz in the Shostakovich, to take just two examples, reveal in their playing that they really feel this music. Ehnes is a marvellous violin player and a perfect musician; my minor doubts are for the same reason I often react with some hesitation to much of the playing of David Oistrakh or Nathan Milstein – both supreme violinists, but without that extra 5% one gets from deep, emotional commitment. Anyway; enough of nit-picking. Ehnes gets my three stars in both works.

Khachaturian's Violin Concerto

Aram Khachaturian chose a bad time to write a violin concerto in D minor. Post-1940 after the concerto was written, music coming from the USSR was derided as propaganda music to please Russian factory workers. And to write music with a key signature, and with tunes, was asking for opprobrium from the Western musical establishment. I recall in the 1960s/70s a BBC music commentator almost apologising for the music [the Khachaturian concerto] that a violinist had just played: “Of course, it's not modern music as we understand it, but the violinist played very well …. “

To this day, the musical establishment still tends to sniff at Aram Khachaturian and its members – unlike musicians or audiences – would rather some tuneless meandering by Alban Berg, Karl-Heinz Stockhausen or Arnold Schönberg were programmed instead. Or yet another Mendelssohn or Bruch. Certainly not Aram Khachaturian!

Well, being musically incorrect, I really like Khachaturian's colourful and tuneful concerto that is well written and should be one of the most popular works for violin and orchestra. The great classic recordings, in my view, were by Julian Sitkovetsky with the Romanian Radio Orchestra and Niyazi in 1954 – a wild and mesmeric performance – and Leonid Kogan with Pierre Monteux in Boston in 1958. Today I listened to two modern recordings: Julia Fischer with Yakov Kreizberg (2004) and Sergey Khachatryan with Emmanuel Krivine (2003). Both Fischer and Khachatryan are truly top violinists. Maybe Khachatryan has a slight edge in authenticity when playing music by a fellow Armenian, but he does suffer from a “correct” recording positioning between soloist and orchestra, whereas I think the soloist in this particular concerto should be allowed to stand out more, a bit like a Primas in a gypsy band. I think Khachaturian's concerto is one of the best of the twentieth century and hope that, like the violin concerto of Benjamin Britten (pretty well exactly the same date of composition) the musical establishment will permit it to be programmed – frequently.

Die Walküre, and Otto Klemperer

During the current period, it is not too often that I settle down and listen to opera; at the moment, I seem to prefer mainly chamber music. But this evening I revelled in Act 1 of Wagner's Die Walküre. Now that is music! Erotic passion at full throttle, much like Tristan and Isolde (Wagner seems to have been good at erotic passion). Only Act 1 this evening; I find the beginning of Act 2 a bit tedious, until we reach the Todesverkündigung towards the end of the act.

This evening's conductor was Otto Klemperer, in the 1960s with three excellent singers and the Philharmonia orchestra. Over the years, I warm to Klemperer more and more. Like me, he had doubts about large chunks of Mahler, Wagner and Strauss – while feeling passionate about some of their works. I love Klemperer's recording of Strauss's Metamorphosen for Strings, to which I have come late in life. And I love Klemperer's passionate conducting of Act 1 of Die Walküre.

Handel's Song for Saint Cecilia's Day

Handel's Song for St Cecilia's Day is one of his most aimiable and tuneful works. It shows Handel's mastery of melody, his genius for the human voice, and his unerring instincts about getting the most out of an instrumental band of moderate size. It's a work I've loved and turned to for a good many years now. Listening to it, one gets the strong impression that Handel really enjoyed himself writing this music to Dryden's poem.

To succeed in such high-class music, any performance needs a good instrumental band, two good soloists, and an efficient right-sized choir. For a recording, add a good recorded balance and a sound that integrates the whole ensemble without overt spotlighting.

The new recording by Ludus, conducted by Richard Neville-Towle and featuring Mary Bevan and Ed Lyon as soloists succeeds on all fronts. The soloists are not earth-shattering, but they are more than adequate. And the recording is exemplary. Thoroughly enjoyable.

It makes me want to acquire Handel's Alexander's Feast by the same forces (but with Mary Bevan's sister). However the two Delphian CDs are at a pretty high price, so I'll have to wait to pluck up courage.

Grieg's "Violin Concertos"

Since the beginning of time, music composers – and others – have arranged and re-arranged music for different instrumental combinations. Brahms' Hungarian Dances began life as piano duets. Prokofiev's second sonata for piano and violin began life as a flute sonata. Not to mention J.S. Bach, and many others … My 1954 recording of Paganini's first violin concerto with Christian Ferras is with … Pierre Barbizet (piano).

Different media rarely transfer well. The Seventh Seal (high among the ten greatest films ever made) would not make a good book, nor a good theatrical play. [For the benefit of the younger generation, The Seventh Seal is not a nature documentary, but a black-and-white film by Ingmar Bergman]. Shakespeare transfers with difficulty to the cinema. The books of the Lord of the Rings, even to devotees like me who have known them since the later 1950s, did – against all my expectations – transfer reasonably well to film. The exception proves the rule. Can you imagine the film of Les Enfants du Paradis as … a book?

Similary, chamber music, as in duo sonatas for violin and piano, is inherently different from orchestral concertos, as in the violin concertos of a Shostakovich, an Elgar or a Brahms. So it was a little foolhardy of Henning Kraggerud (aided by Bernt Simen Lund) to inflate the aimiable three sonatas for violin and piano by Grieg and to try to transform them into concertos for violin and orchestra (the Tromsø Chamber Orchestra). In my view, it just does not work. Grieg's music remains as tuneful and enjoyable as ever, but this is emphatically not music conceived for a violin with an orchestra. Had Grieg wanted to do that, he would undoubtedly have composed things quite differently.

Mengelberg in Mahler

I spent an interesting hour listening to Mahler's 4th symphony played by the Concertgebouw Orchestra at a concert on the 9th November 1939 in Amsterdam, conducted by Willem Mengelberg. Mengelberg, the orchestra and Mahler all knew each other well, so there was a fascinating air of authenticity about the performance. Was this how Mahler conducted it? (Mengelberg was present at the first performance, and worked on the conducting score with the composer).

I found the performance fascinating in the degree of personal involvement between conductor and the score. One feels Mengelberg's love of the work, and notices how many conductors – especially in the pre 1945 decades – took what was later called “liberties” with the score. Tempi are manipulated constantly. After 1945, the stern doctrine ascribed to Toscanini came to be fashionable, but there were always conductors who felt free to bring their individual thoughts and feelings to a work: conductors such as Furtwängler, Walter – and Mengelberg. In the 1950s, Toscanini and Furtwängler were classed as the leaders of the opposing traditions. In Britain, it might have been John Barbirolli versus Adrian Boult. At the present time, it might be Christian Thielemann versus Riccardo Chailly. Pre-war, Otto Klemperer was something of an exception; a major German conductor who stuck strictly to the score. We are not used to hearing music beamed through a personal medium and, to many, Mahler's 4th as played by Mengelberg will sound strange and maybe a little bizarre. In music, however, it's the end result that counts and I would rather hear Mengelberg's idiosyncratic performance as here, than Mr X's scrupulous adhesion to the letter of the score. Just as I would rather listen to Furtwängler and the Vienna Philharmonic in Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony than hear the latest “authentic” band trying to reconstruct what they imagine Beethoven's first audience might have heard. The proof of the pudding is in the eating, and that is especially true in musical performance.

I like Mahler's 4th symphony (actually, it's the only Mahler symphony I like since I first met it in 1958 conducted by Paul Kletzki, still a splendid “straight” version). Everyone needs the work conducted by Kletzki, Mengelberg, Klemperer and Walter; four conductors with close connections to the work, four very different views of the work, four admirable results.

Handel's Giove in Argo

Handel's opera Giove in Argo makes for enjoyable Sunday listening. Thrown together in haste during a critical commercial juncture in Handel's later career, the composer raided his melody bank (and that of others) for a collection of attractive arias, all revolving round the usual ridiculous plot in which everyone seems to be disguised as each other. No matter; the music is first class. Handel was not only adept at writing superb melodies, but he also had a real feeling for the human voice, for the setting of words to music and, most notably, for providing varied and interesting instrumental backing to the singing. Many of the arias are re-cycled from previous works by Handel (and occasionally by others) but why waste a good tune? Unusually for a Handel opera, there are many choruses in the work; although I am usually anti choral music, the choruses here are most pleasant and make a good contribution to the work.

The performance of this newly-assembled opera is conducted by the ever-reliable Alan Curtis, who presides over a caste with no weak links. Pacing and balance are excellent, as is the recording and the playing of Il Complesso Barocco. A good Sunday as I recover from the second bout of norovirus in around nine months.

Schubert's last piano sonata D 960

Schubert's last piano sonata, number 21 in B flat major D 960 written in 1828, has long been my favourite piano sonata, and one of my favourite pieces of music. There is something miraculous in the late works of Schubert, as the music moves through a myriad of modulations, and moods change almost from bar to bar. Schubert's last works are rarely happy, angry, sad or joyful but oscillate between every possible mood of human life.

To my mind, music such as this is best played “straight” without interpreter intervention. The music in D 960 is completely self-explanatory when played as-is and this is what I find so attractive in the new recording by Maria Pires which becomes one of my favourite recordings of this work (of which I currently own no less than fourteen versions). Bravo, Maria for just playing the music.

In general, I am doubtful about making exposition repeats in music of the classical period. It seems to me that the instruction to repeat was often based on the desire to make the music last longer, or often on the knowledge that pretty well everyone would only ever hear the work in question once only, therefore the themes needed to be impressed on the listeners. But sometimes, of course, the repeat was there for reasons of structure and balance; the eighteenth century classical period set great store by the concept of balance. After around 1820, the idea of balance began to crumble, Beethoven perhaps setting the pace with the enormous finale of his ninth symphony and, orginally, the Great Fugue as the final movement of his opus 130 string quartet in B flat major (and see also his final piano sonata, with just two movements, the final variations being one long movement). Those who wish to force poor old Schubert into the 18th century sonata mold avoid the repeat in the first movement of the D 960 sonata, even though Schubert explicitly wrote bars of music to link the exposition repeat. Pianists as eminent as Schnabel and Curzon do not repeat the exposition which, if the movement is played at a true molto moderato as marked, brings the first movement in at over 20 minutes (with Pires, or 23 minutes with Richter). But, for me, Schubert was not writing a classical 18th century sonata and his music was heading towards the land of the fantasia or improvisation where classical structure was less important. Here, I have no doubt whatsoever that the first movement exposition repeat should be made, and bravo to those who do so.

Pheasant Quartet

Today sees the last of the quartet of pheasants I bought from the local butcher for £9.99 the four. Casseroled in a strong vegetable court-bouillon, with a couple of glasses of red wine, a few cloves, lots of thyme and bay leaves, salt, pepper, mushrooms, bacon. Pretty delicious. And that is the end of pheasants for six months or so, until they come back into season. Some of the world's cheapest food; four pheasants provide the meat for at least 12 meals.

Two Baroque Sopranos

Into my postbox came Anna Prohaska singing airs and arias by Vivaldi, Purcell, Handel and a couple of others. And Dorothee Mields singing Telemann arias. Two German sopranos, repertoire from a similar time period (late 17th century, early 18th – an excellent era in music). Prohaska is with a “baroque” orchestra directed by Jonathan Cohen; Mields with a similar group led by Michi Gaigg. One on Archiv Produktion. The other on Deutsche Harmonia Mundi.


Georg Philipp Telemann rose in my esteem once I discovered his vocal music (cantatas, and operas). Until recently, I had him pigeon-holed as old Herr Tafelmusik, but his arias are a different kettle of fish, and most attractive music. Ms Mields has a gentle, very feminine voice that fits the pieces on this CD like a glove. She also has splendid diction; if you lose your place in the texts in the booklet, it is easy to pick it up again. The Austrian band under Michi Gaigg makes a positive, thoroughly professional contribution. Listening to this CD is an excellent way to spend a Sunday morning.

Then on to Anna Prohaska. The Mields CD has two photos of the soprano; Ms Prohaska's has at least ten photos of its soprano, most in the guise of a wanton woodland nymph (for some reason or another, the disc is billed as “Enchanted Forest”). The vocal music of Handel and Purcell is always a sure-fire winner with me, though I am less keen on the two early verbose Italians tacked on to the end of the CD – Cavalli, and Monteverdi. My musical garden begins around the end of the 17th century with Purcell, and ends around 250 years later with Britten and Shostakovich. I have yards of Monteverdi's music in my collection, and it all sounds pretty much the same to my ears. Ms Prohaska's voice is more brilliant than Ms Mields and, recorded well forward as here, it can often sound rather strident. Playing the music at a volume where the soprano does not blow your socks off has the unfortunate effect of reducing much of the instrumental contribution to the background; the many violin solos by the ever-talented Stéphanie-Marie Degand (who leads the band) are very distant, a great pity in Purcell's “Oh let me weep”. I am also occasionally uneasy about Ms Prohaska's intonation, and her diction is not in the class of Dorothee Mields; lose your place in the text when Ms Prohaska is singing, and you are lost until the next aria.

So Dorothee goes on the “keep to hand” pile; Anna is filed on the shelf in the vocal compilation section.

Deborah Nemtanu

I recently enthused over the music of Camille Saint-Saëns (disc by Fanny Clamagirand). Suddenly I am faced with more Saint-Saëns, played this time by the unknown (to me) Deborah Nemtanu (with the Orchestre de Chambre de Paris conducted by Thomas Zehetmair, another fine violinist).

Nemtanu plays the well-known Introduction & Rondo Capriccioso, the first violin concerto, and an enchanting Romance, Opus 48. She also throws in Fauré's familiar Berceuse. The orchestra under Zehetmair plays the suite from Fauré's Pelléas et Mélisande. A lovely CD. Ms Nemtanu plays with intelligence, clarity and impeccable technique and has a real feeling for this music that is never vulgar, never trite, always tasteful. The violin is well recorded, the orchestra a little on the dim side. Another CD to keep near at hand for dipping into when I feel like a little dose of civilisation. We live in good (violinistic) times.

Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst

The 1930s, 50s and 60s were marvellous years for recording; for a few top artists, and for mainstream repertoire. Not so great if you were looking for Handel operas, or for the violin music of Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst. The music of Ernst is little known and has been much neglected. But he wrote large quantities of tuneful and enjoyable salon music for the violin – much like Pablo Sarasate in a later period – and I have enjoyed catching up with him, at last. Josef Spacek (who?) plays a thoroughly listenable selection of Ernst on a recent CD (Naxos, of course; what would lovers of the violin do without St Naxos?) Spacek is just right for this music, and is well recorded -- in Monmouth, like the recent Naxos CD of Fanny Clamagirand.

Julia Lezhneva

Reflecting recently on listening to Handel's Alessandro, I commented: “Of the two female rivals, Julia Lezhneva (Rossane) struck me as exceptional, with a voice that is attractive, accurate and that appears to mean what she is singing”.

Well, today the postgirl brought a new solo CD sung by Lezhneva, the 23 year old Russian from Sakhalin Island. What a voice! Few musicians in their early 20s, especially singers, can have had such an inpact. Ms Lezhneva goes on to my “auto-buy” list for the future, a list inhabited by few 23-year olds apart from Tianwa Yang.

Quibbles? I have the impression that the CD started with a concept: “we'll call it Alleluja, so we need four works for soprano ending with Alleluja”. Always bad to start with a concept, and then to hunt around to fill out the concept. The CD contains cantatas for solo soprano by Vivaldi, Handel, Porpora and Mozart. Of the four, only the Vivaldi could be classed as first-class music. The other three works are somwhat second class, including the motet by the 16-year old Mozart. That is the problem with starting with a concept. Four first-class works for soprano by Vivaldi, Handel, Porpora and Mozart present no great challenge; it's just when you stipulate they all have to end with Alleluja that the problems begin …

Almost certainly not Ms Lezhneva's fault; it's those loser modern marketing gurus again. Let me hope that next time Ms Lezhneva records, she gets to choose the music, and the marketing gurus just have to fit in with her choice

Fanny Clamagirand plays Saint-Saëns

Camille Saint-Saëns had a long life (1835-1921) and wrote a great deal of music of all types. His music is melodic, well-crafted and highly agreeable to listen to. No great emotional depths are explored; but so what? It is a bit ridiculous that apart from his “organ” symphony and a few other bits and pieces, his music rarely sees the light of day in the concert hall. I have just spent 68 enjoyable minutes listening to a CD recital of some of his music for violin and piano, including the 23 minute long first sonata that was a favourite of Jascha Heifetz (and is also a great favourite of mine). The violinist of my new Naxos CD is Fanny Clamagirand, not yet 30 and a violinist I have always liked. The world is pulsating with first-class young violinists (many of them female).

Ms Clamagirand plays the first sonata, and also offers ten other shorter pieces by Saint-Saëns, all of them good to hear. She plays extremely well and with obvious feeling for the music, and does not even wilt in comparison with Heifetz in the sonata, partly due to her excellent pianist, Vanya Cohen, and partly to the entirely admirable recording by “Producer, Engineer & Editor” John Taylor; balancing violin and piano, particularly in louder music, is no easy task, as countless failures demonstrate. All praise to Mr Taylor. I spend much time in this blog criticising recording balance. Good to be able to express satisfaction, for a change.

Another good Naxos, then. What a remarkable company, particularly for lovers of violin music. I find it difficult to understand why Saint-Saëns' music is not programmed more often. Could we not at least have the refreshing first violin and piano sonata, rather than yet another rendition of the Franck sonata / Kreutzer / Brahms / Ravel sonata?

Frank Peter Zimmermann and Enrico Pace in Bach

The set of six sonatas and partitas that Johann Sebastian Bach wrote for solo violin are well known, much played and recorded, and in the repertoire of every violinist of stature. The six sonatas for violin and keyboard BWV 1014-19 are less well known and less often played.With the solo works, the violinist does not share the spotlight with a pianist or an orchestra. With the duo sonatas, he or she has to play with a keyboard player, and play second fiddle much of the time, since the keyboard part is dominant in these works. Similarly, a keyboard player here has to share the limelight with a violinist.

I was intrigued last week when the BBC programme “Building a Library” picked Frank Peter Zimmermann and Enrico Pace as the top recommendation in the six duo sonatas; intrigued, since the BBC is usually ultra musically correct and follows fashions, and the Zimmermann-Pace set is with grand piano and non-baroque violin (a Stradivarius of roughly the same date as these sonatas).

I know these six sonatas pretty well, having played them often many decades ago when I lived in Germany (with an Australian pianist). I love the works, and really enjoyed the Zimmermann-Pace set. It is the only set I have without a harpsichord (an instrument to which I am not partial); to my ears, a harpsichord brings nothing to the works that one cannot have eight times more melodiously with a good pianist. There is music that is written for particular instruments, or instrumental combinations – most string quartets, for example, do not transfer to orchestral massed strings. Most of Bach's music outside the organ works does not seem to have been written with a particular instrumental colour or capability in mind; Bach rarely hesitated about borrowing his own, or other people's, works for different instrumental colours. Sitting back with J S Bach, Frank Peter Zimmermann and Enrico Pace, one is guaranteed an excellent 90 minutes or so of music. The recorded balance is correct for a change, with the piano being dominant, as the music requires. All the tempi sound fine to me, and the music has a strong element of dancing throughout.

It is regrettable that these duo sonatas are not better known. Within their 25 movements there are magnificent riches, and nothing is less than by a great composer. I love the solo violin works, but they do have their weaker sides: I have never felt that the three fugues are enjoyable and magnificent music (as opposed to major compositional and technical tours de force). The first partita can go on rather too long (especially as played a while ago by Lisa Batiashvili, who played deliberately and made every repeat it was possible to make – the piece lasted over half an hour. Milstein, when he played the first partita in public, wisely missed out all the repeats). And the final partita, after its brilliant prelude, can come over as everyday dance music of the early 18th century without too much originality.