Sonata for Violin and Piano in B minor - Respighi

Sonata for Violin and Piano in E flat, op 18 - R. Strauss

It was a pleasure to be confronted by two unfamiliar works, especially when played with obvious skill and dedication, which help to fill in one's picture of the past century of music-making.

The violin sonatas of Respighi and Strauss, written in 1917 and 1887 respectively, are in some ways farther beyond our mental horizon than Beethoven or Bach, and Paul Fanning (violin) and Rachel Quinn (piano) must have made a considerable imaginative leap in order to become one with the extraordinary opulence of sound aimed at in these sonatas.

Respighi's sonata has a strong lyrical impulse which at every moment seems about to drown in a sugary complexity: the players were tested but succeeded in making the exoticism seem as natural as a jungle growth in which brilliant and attractive flowers breathe a miasma of decay.

After Respighi the Strauss, possibly even more difficult to play, was a model of clarity and subtlety.

Here the virtuosity demanded of the players was put to the service of a music where interest outweighed the ostentation - it was a clearing in the jungle.