| Label: NAXOS
Catalog: 8572292
Format: CD TRICKEY; LLEWELYN-JONESWholenote Discoveries - June 2011
This disc features the Violin Sonatas of the Welsh composer William Mathias (1934-92), performed by Sara Trickey and Iwan Llewelyn-Jones . The Sonata No.1 was written in 1961 on a commission from the Cheltenham Festival, where it was first performed in 1962. It has a sparse, angular opening - “spiky and aggressively rhythmic” in the composer’s words - with a lyrical middle movement and an energetic finale. Sonata No.2 was a commission to celebrate Mathias’s 50th birthday in 1984; the booklet notes rightly refer to the “four vividly contrasted movements” making “virtuosic demands of both performers.” I found the third work on the disc, the world premiere recording of the Violin Sonata (1952), to be the most enjoyable - perhaps surprisingly, given that Mathias apparently chose not to recognize it. Written when he was 18, and between school and university, it was the first work of the composer’s to be performed in public, and was the first entry in Mathias’s personal catalogue of compositions, albeit without an opus number. It was subsequently withdrawn and never performed again. In 1992 Mathias reviewed his entire catalogue, and chose to rehabilitate some of his withdrawn works - but this wasn’t one of them. Since his death, however, his estate has occasionally given careful consideration to the limited release of the withdrawn scores, and agreed to the inclusion of the work in this CD. Sara Trickey is a precise and accurate player, with a sweet tone, possibly a bit thin at times, but not a great deal of tonal or dynamic contrast. Her vibrato seems a bit unfocussed in the slower passages, and she only really seems to take flight in the faster, rhythmic sections. On this evidence I’m not sure I would call her playing “fiery and passionate” (the quote from The Strad magazine that dominates her publicity material) - The Guardian’s reference to her “clean-cut precision” seems much more appropriate. Terry Robbins  Price: $19.98 |
