Strauss & Shostakovich: Sonatas for Violin and Piano

Album review

As a reflection of the rise of a young 23-year-old musician with a bright future, Richard Strauss’ Violin Sonata in E-flat major, Op. 18 dates back to 1887-1888. As a protégé of Hans von Bülow who saw in him the great musician of the future, the young man made his debut as a conductor, an activity he would combine with composing throughout his life. Strauss studied the piano and the violin; here, he uses them both to purely expressive ends, dismissing any vain attempt at virtuosity. The writing is lyrical above all else, as evidenced by the harmonic and melodic turns that clearly prefigure his later lyrical works’ expression and convoluted melisma.
Shostakovich’s Sonata for Violin and Piano in G major, Op. 134 is the complete antithesis of Strauss’. Composed in 1968 as a 60th-birthday present for great violinist David Oistrakh, it is the work of a sick composer, partially paralysed and suffering from lung cancer due to smoking. Accused of “formalism” and taxed as “enemy of the people” by Soviet leaders, Shostakovich wrote a painful, austere piece, the implacable and tragic confession of his own sadness.
Born in the GDR in 1969, violinist Franziska Pietsch studied in Germany, then at the Juilliard School in New York before perfecting her craft with Ruggiero Ricci and Zakhar Bron. Her partner, Spanish pianist Josu de Solaun, has won several international prizes (Valencia, New York, Prague, Bucharest) and performs all around the world. © François Hudry/Qobuz