Mieczysław Weinberg - Cello Sonatas (Alexander Chaushian; Yevgeny Sudbin)

Information

Composer: Mieczysław Weinberg

• Sonata No. 1 for Cello and Piano, Op. 21
• Sonata No. 1 for Cello and Piano, Op. 21
• Sonata No. 2 for Cello and Piano, Op. 63

Alexander Chaushian, cello

Yevgeny Sudbin, piano

Date: 2007

Label: BIS

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Review

Armenian-born Alexander Chaushian makes a persuasive case for the music of Moisey Weinberg in this his first solo CD. Weinberg fled Warsaw for Russia in 1939, moving to Moscow in 1943 at the invitation of Shostakovich. Both his Sonata for solo cello and his Cello Concerto were premiered by Rostropovich, and there’s a recording on Russian Disc of Weinberg playing both of his accompanied sonatas with Rostropovich pupil Alla Vasilieva two years before his death in 1996.

Both prolific composers, Shostakovich and Weinberg had a close musical relationship, and though Weinberg undoubtedly saw himself as a disciple of Shostakovich, Weinberg’s own use of Jewish musical idioms certainly rubbed off on the older composer.

Weinberg’s predilection for unaccompanied cello is obvious even in the First Cello Sonata, which opens with an extensive, rather melancholy solo introduction, eloquently phrased by Chaushian, and has at the centre of its second movement a long solo cello cadenza, moving from reflection to some highly expressive double-stopping. In its more stormy moments, Chaushian, despite projecting for all he’s worth, is drowned out by the more resonant piano in this clear, bright recording.

You can imagine Rostropovich playing the solo sonata – perhaps because its Allegro brings to mind the Moto perpetuo of Britten’s first suite from four years later. Chaushian, who studied with Kagan and then Pergamenschikow and David Geringas, plays the 18th-century-style Allegretto with a delightfully gentle touch, its pizzicato moments dextrously accomplished, and gives persuasive and committed performances of both this and Sonata no.2, whose Bartókian finale closes in a mad frenzy of rocking quavers.  

— Janet Banks

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Mieczysław Weinberg (8 December 1919 – 26 February 1996) was a Polish-born Soviet and Russian composer and pianist. Born in Warsaw to a family connected with Yiddish theatre, he fled Poland in 1939 following the German invasion and settled in the Soviet Union, where he gained the support of Dmitri Shostakovich. Weinberg became a prolific and respected composer, particularly during the 1960s, when his concert and film music achieved considerable recognition. His later years were marked by declining health and reduced official support. International appreciation of his music grew significantly in the 1990s.

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Alexander Chaushian (born 1977 in Yerevan) is an Armenian cellist. Educated in Armenia, the UK and Germany, he studied at the Yehudi Menuhin School, the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler. A prizewinner at the International Tchaikovsky and ARD Competitions, he has toured extensively, notably as a Young Concert Artists alumnus in the United States. Chaushian has appeared with leading orchestras worldwide, performs regularly with prominent collaborators, records for BIS, and serves as Artistic Director of major music festivals in Yerevan and Cyprus.

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Yevgeny Sudbin (born 19 April 1980) is a Russian-born British concert pianist. He studied at the musical school of the Leningrad Conservatory. After his family emigrated to Berlin in 1990, he studied at the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler, then at the Purcell School and the Royal Academy of Music in London. Sudbin has lived in the UK since 1997, and made his debut at The Proms in July 2008. In September 2010, he was appointed visiting professor of piano at the Royal Academy of Music. Sudbin has recorded music of Mozart, Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov, Medtner, Scarlatti, and Scriabin for the BIS label.

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