Reynaldo Hahn - Piano Quartet; Violin Sonata (Room-Music)

Information

Composer: Reynaldo Hahn

• Violin Sonata in C major
• Soliloque et forlane, for viola & piano
• Nocturne in E flat major, for violin & piano
• Romance in A major, for violin & piano
• Piano Quartet No. 3 in G major
• Si mes vers avaient des ailes, for cello & piano

Room-Music

    Charles Sewart, violin

    Yuko Inoue, viola

    Philip De Groote, cello

    Stephen Coombs, piano

Date: 2003

Label: Hyperion

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Review

I became acquainted with the music of Reynaldo Hahn through Hyperion's previous issue of exquisite songs and must also say that his style touched my heart immediately. This fine selection of chamber music is no less invigorating and is permeated with an indelible nostalgia that lingers throughout all the works.

The Sonata is an exquisite peace full of meandering and haunting beauty with the markings entirely appropriate for the music on offer. Room Music gives what can be said to be a definitive interpretation all around with a particularly fine 'Modere', keeping the pulse of the music throbbing very well indeed.

Three short pieces then follow in succession, 'Soliloque et Forlane', a Nocturne and a Romance. Each is imbued with the distinctive Hahn style and the combination of Charles Sewart, Yuko Inoue and Stephen Coombs is most inspired. I also greatly enjoyed the 1946 Piano Quartet which I feel is the highlight of the disc with its throwback to a vanished age. The concluding song is also very apt, taking us back to 1888. I have nothing but praise for this project which most definitely does a great deal for the re-establishment of Hahn's reputation.

— Gerald Fenech

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Reynaldo Hahn (9 August 1874 – 28 January 1947) was a Venezuelan-born French composer best known for his elegant art songs. Moved to Paris as a child, he studied at the Conservatoire under Jules Massenet and later served as music critic for Le Figaro before becoming director of the Paris Opéra in 1945. Hahn composed operettas, ballets, incidental music and piano works, with Ciboulette (1923) among his most successful stage works. Inspired by literary figures such as Marcel Proust, he created music admired for its lyricism and refinement. His song Si mes vers avaient des ailes remains a concert favourite.

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Stephen Coombs (born 11 July 1960 in Birkenhead) is a British pianist. He achieved early success, gaining 2nd place at the National Piano Concerto Competition at age 13 and a Gold Medal at the International Liszt Piano Competition in Sopron, Hungary when he was 16. Coombs studied at the Royal Northern College of Music, then at the Royal Academy of Music with Gordon Green. He began recording for Hyperion in 1989. His recordings include the complete solo piano music of Glazunov and other discs of Russian solo piano repertoire (Scriabin, Arensky, Liadov, Bortkiewicz), as well as for Hyperion's Romantic Piano Concerto series.

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