This beautifully balanced programme traces a century of violin music through five distinctive voices — from Beethoven’s youthful brilliance to Weinberg’s haunting post-war lyricism — exploring the power of the violin and the piano to sing, to dance, and to speak with human intimacy.
Beethoven’s Violin Sonata in A, Op. 12 No. 2 (1797–98) belongs to his first set of violin sonatas, dedicated to his teacher Antonio Salieri. At this early stage, Beethoven was eager to assert the violin and piano as equals, moving beyond the eighteenth-century convention of the violin as mere accompaniment. The sonata brims with youthful energy and wit: the opening Allegro vivace is sparkling and conversational, the Andante more refined and tender, and the final Allegro piacevole full of quicksilver humour and rhythmic play.
A generation later, Gabriel Fauré’s Violin Sonata No. 1 in A, Op. 13 (1876) brought French chamber music into a new era. Brimming with freshness and lyrical warmth, it pairs classical poise with harmonic daring. The first movement’s soaring melodies and the gentle Andante’s long-breathed lines are quintessentially Fauré, while the scherzo’s fleet lightness and the radiant finale reveal a composer balancing grace with passion. Fauré’s Three Mélodies, Op. 23 — including the beloved Les Berceaux — were written around the same time, and their subtle vocal inflections illuminate the same qualities of restraint and emotional depth found in his instrumental music.
After the interval comes Elgar’s Violin Sonata in E minor, Op. 82 (1918), composed in the aftermath of the First World War. Written in the seclusion of Sussex, the sonata captures Elgar’s reflective, autumnal mood. The opening’s intensity gives way to a wistful Romance, and the finale — marked Allegro non troppo — moves between turbulence and transcendence, embodying the mixture of nostalgia and nobility so characteristic of Elgar’s late style.
The recital concludes with Mieczysław Weinberg’s Rhapsody on Moldavian Themes, Op. 47 No. 3 (1949), a dazzling tribute to the folk music of Eastern Europe. Its exuberant dance rhythms, soulful cantilena, and virtuosic flair offer an exuberant finale — a celebration of resilience and the enduring vitality of melody
Dr Simon Callaghan 2025
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