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Brahms: Viola Sonatas / Hagen, Gulda


Release Date: 03/03/2009 
Label:  Deutsche Grammophon   Catalog #: 453421  
Composer:  Johannes Brahms
Performer:  Veronika Hagen,  Paul Gulda,  Iris Vermillion
Number of Discs: 1 
Recorded in: Stereo 
Low Stock: Currently 3 or fewer in stock. Usually ships in 24 hours, unless stock becomes depleted.  

This CD is reissued by ArkivMusic.

Notes and Editorial Reviews

"The two viola sonatas feature strong piano playing from Paul Gulda (Friedrich’s son), most particularly in the last movement of the F minor and the second movement of the E flat major (with its noble sostenuto ‘trio’). Veronika Hagen’s sinewy tone suggests a lean mezzo to compare with the mellow baritone of, say, William Primrose. Gulda is at his most poetic in the First Sonata’s second movement, but although both players have the measure of Brahms’s muse, I sensed the balance of power was weighted rather too much in Gulda’s favour.

By far the best items on the disc are the two Op. 91 songs, where Iris Vermillion – a luminous-sounding mezzo with keen textual awareness – melds among her colleagues like a third Read more instrumentalist. Both performances are remarkably fluent...Very well recorded and expertly annotated by Bernard Jacobson."

-- Gramophone [5/1997]
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Works on This Recording

1.
Sonata for Clarinet/Viola and Piano no 1 in F minor, Op. 120 no 1 by Johannes Brahms
Performer:  Veronika Hagen (Viola), Paul Gulda (Piano)
Period: Romantic 
Written: 1894; Germany 
2.
Sonata for Clarinet/Viola and Piano no 2 in E flat major, Op. 120 no 2 by Johannes Brahms
Performer:  Veronika Hagen (Viola), Paul Gulda (Piano)
Period: Romantic 
Written: 1894; Germany 
3.
Songs (2) for Alto, Viola and Piano, Op. 91 by Johannes Brahms
Performer:  Paul Gulda (Piano), Veronika Hagen (Viola), Iris Vermillion (Mezzo Soprano)
Period: Romantic 
Written: ?1864-84; Austria 

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