MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2024
60,000 reviews
... and still writing ...

Search MusicWeb Here Acte Prealable Polish CDs
 

Presto Music CD retailer
 
Founder: Len Mullenger                                    Editor in Chief:John Quinn             


Some items
to consider

new MWI
Current reviews

old MWI
pre-2023 reviews

paid for
advertisements

Acte Prealable Polish recordings

Forgotten Recordings
Forgotten Recordings
All Forgotten Records Reviews

TROUBADISC
Troubadisc Weinberg- TROCD01450

All Troubadisc reviews


FOGHORN Classics

Alexandra-Quartet
Brahms String Quartets

All Foghorn Reviews


All HDTT reviews


Songs to Harp from
the Old and New World


all Nimbus reviews



all tudor reviews


Follow us on Twitter


Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Editor in Chief
John Quinn
Contributing Editor
Ralph Moore
Webmaster
   David Barker
Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf
MusicWeb Founder
   Len Mullenger


 
REVIEW


Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos reviews

Chandos recordings
All Chandos reviews

Hyperion recordings
All Hyperion reviews

Foghorn recordings
All Foghorn reviews

Troubadisc recordings
All Troubadisc reviews



all Bridge reviews


all cpo reviews

Divine Art recordings
Click to see New Releases
Get 10% off using code musicweb10
All Divine Art reviews


All Eloquence reviews

Lyrita recordings
All Lyrita Reviews

 

Wyastone New Releases
Obtain 10% discount

Subscribe to our free weekly review listing

 

 

alternatively
CD: AmazonUK AmazonUS
Download: Classicsonline


Moishei VAINBERG (Mieczyslaw WEINBERG) (1919-1996)
Works for Violin and Piano - Volume 1
Violin Sonata No.4 Op.39 (1947) [19:58]
Violin Sonata No.5 Op.53 (1953) [22:59]
Three Pieces for Violin and Piano (1934) [13:26]
Stefan Kirpal (violin)
Andreas Kirpal (piano)
rec. August 2007, Hochschule für Musik und Theater, Munich
CPO 777 456-2 [57:27]

 

Experience Classicsonline


 
Vainberg’s violin sonatas are not, I suspect, the most known and digested of his large corpus of pieces. Among the chamber music the quartets probably have the most immediate hold on auditors, and they are indeed fascinatingly persuasive examples of his art. It appears however that the Fifth Violin Sonata has never previously been recorded so this makes the appearance of Stefan and Andreas Kirpal’s recording something of a coup. It’s coupled with the Fourth Sonata and the very early Three Pieces, written when the composer was in his mid teens.
 
Now that the Kirpals are embarking on a violin and piano series – this is the inaugural volume – perhaps these works will become more part of the bloodstream of appreciation for Vainberg. The Fourth Sonata dates from 1947. It was dedicated to Leonid Kogan, the rising star in the firmament of Soviet violinists but who was still at the time a student, so it’s possible the dedication may have come later. In any case it had to wait until 1968 for its actual premiere. The sonata is in three movements of which the first is by far the longest – in fact it’s much longer than the other two movements combined, which gives the work an unusual topography. It opens with sepulchral polyphony in the piano introduction, before the austerely lyric violin enters. Vainberg takes the violin extremely high in post-Szymanowski fashion. The central movement is an urgent march, vital and exciting, and which prefigures a double stopping cadenza. The finale is meditative, reflective and moonlight-still.
 
The Fifth Sonata was written in 1953 and dedicated to Shostakovich. The four movements are much more conventionally laid out here. The opening has a Miaskovskian, earnest, lyric beauty, whilst the second has moments of easy folkloric influence. The start of the finale ruminates on the earlier lyric themes before embracing an Allegretto – optimistic, alert and buoyant – which soon clouds over and ends quietly, though not pessimistically. It’s high time that the work has been recorded. It may seem less complex and ambiguous than much of his writing but it’s good to be acquainted with its more unbuttoned patina.
 
The Three Pieces are a nocturne, scherzo and ‘Dream about a Doll’ and were written in 1934. He certainly knew how to do crepuscular and the scherzo elements of Perpetuum Mobile Gothic, even at the age of fifteen. The Brothers Kirpal take full advantage of the chances for rich characterisation, as indeed they do throughout this finely recorded recital. It inaugurates a promising series by cannily presenting one pretty much unknown work, with confidence and with authority.
 
Jonathan Woolf
 
 


EXPLORE MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL

Making a Donation to MusicWeb

Writing CD reviews for MWI

About MWI
Who we are, where we have come from and how we do it.

Site Map

How to find a review

How to find articles on MusicWeb
Listed in date order

Review Indexes
   By Label
      Select a label and all reviews are listed in Catalogue order
   By Masterwork
            Links from composer names (eg Sibelius) are to resource pages with links to the review indexes for the individual works as well as other resources.

Themed Review pages

Jazz reviews

 

Discographies
   Composer
      Composer surveys
   National
      Unique to MusicWeb -
a comprehensive listing of all LP and CD recordings of given works
.
Prepared by Michael Herman

The Collector’s Guide to Gramophone Company Record Labels 1898 - 1925
Howard Friedman

Book Reviews

Complete Books
We have a number of out of print complete books on-line

Interviews
With Composers, Conductors, Singers, Instumentalists and others
Includes those on the Seen and Heard site

Nostalgia

Nostalgia CD reviews

Records Of The Year
Each reviewer is given the opportunity to select the best of the releases

Monthly Best Buys
Recordings of the Month and Bargains of the Month

Comment
Arthur Butterworth Writes

An occasional column

Phil Scowcroft's Garlands
British Light Music articles

Classical blogs
A listing of Classical Music Blogs external to MusicWeb International

Reviewers Logs
What they have been listening to for pleasure

Announcements

 

Community
Bulletin Board

Give your opinions or seek answers

Reviewers
Past and present

Helpers invited!

Resources
How Did I Miss That?

Currently suspended but there are a lot there with sound clips


Composer Resources

British Composers

British Light Music Composers

Other composers

Film Music (Archive)
Film Music on the Web (Closed in December 2006)

Programme Notes
For concert organizers

External sites
British Music Society
The BBC Proms
Orchestra Sites
Recording Companies & Retailers
Online Music
Agents & Marketing
Publishers
Other links
Newsgroups
Web News sites etc

PotPourri
A pot-pourri of articles

MW Listening Room
MW Office

Advice to Windows Vista users  
Questionnaire    
Site History  
What they say about us
What we say about us!
Where to get help on the Internet
CD orders By Special Request
Graphics archive
Currency Converter
Dictionary
Magazines
Newsfeed  
Web Ring
Translation Service

Rules for potential reviewers :-)
Do Not Go Here!
April Fools






Untitled Document


Reviews from previous months
Join the mailing list and receive a hyperlinked weekly update on the discs reviewed. details
We welcome feedback on our reviews. Please use the Bulletin Board
Please paste in the first line of your comments the URL of the review to which you refer.