{"id":8468,"date":"2012-12-14T07:38:22","date_gmt":"2012-12-14T12:38:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/?p=8468"},"modified":"2012-12-14T07:38:22","modified_gmt":"2012-12-14T12:38:22","slug":"daily-album-review-28-cellist-sol-gabetta-tames-pianist-helene-grimaud-in-elegant-partnership","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/2012\/12\/14\/daily-album-review-28-cellist-sol-gabetta-tames-pianist-helene-grimaud-in-elegant-partnership\/","title":{"rendered":"Daily album review 28: Cellist Sol Gabetta tames pianist H\u00e9l\u00e8ne Grimaud in elegant partnership"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Argentinean-born cellist Sol Gabetta and French pianist H\u00e9l\u00e8ne Grimaud, the poster girls of free-spirited solo playing, have teamed up on a collaborative album that is surprisingly tame on first listen. But then the appreciation for what they’ve accomplished begins to grow.<\/p>\n

Grimaud, a decade older than musical partner Gabetta on Duo<\/em>, released this fall by Deutsche Grammophon, appears to have encountered someone who can smooth the sharper edges of her sometimes wilful interpretations.<\/p>\n

The album’s programme slices through the core of the cello-and-piano repertoire and is laid out in strict chronological order.<\/p>\n

It begins with Robert Schumann’s three Op. 73 Fantasiest\u00fccke<\/em> from 1849. Although the work is not labelled as such, its three parts work together much like a three-movement sonata.<\/p>\n

The mood is set for the balance of the album, balancing the lyrical with the serious, and the strict collaboration of piano and cello as equal partners.<\/p>\n

Also set from the first notes is an atmosphere of elegant restraint. Schumann’s may be Romantic music, but that’s no excuse to overindulge in drama.<\/p>\n

The two artists are particularly careful to sculpt long, arcing musical phrases, they breathe as one, but they do it with metaphorical straight faces rather than by chewing the scenery.<\/p>\n

The three sonatas that make up the rest of the disc are Johannes Brahms’s Op. 38 in E minor — dating from 1865, it is a deep-and-delicious favourite of mine that subtly pays homage to Bach in its musical motifs — the short work in Claude Debussy finished in 1915, and the much more substantial 1934 four-movement piece by Dmitri Shostakovich — the last two both in D minor.<\/p>\n

Both artists have remarkable control over their instruments. Gabetta has a silken bow that turns steely only when absolutely necessary. Grimaud’s clear, highly articulated playing finds the right emphasis.<\/p>\n

I particularly like how the album is not just a showcase for two great artists whose parts add up to something greater, but it also works as a beautiful, easy lesson in the evolution of emotional language in music from the mid-19th to the mid-20th century.<\/p>\n

For more details on this disc, click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Here is a background video on the recording, made by Deutsche Grammophon:<\/p>\n