Glazunov: Piano Sonata No. 2 in E Minor, Op. 75

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In just 26 stunningly-dense minutes, the composer seems, in 1901, to be clearing out all the last vestiges of the 19th century in his musical vocabulary. No surprise, then, that he was admired by Stravinsky for his formal rigour and his terse, compact language: there isn't a single note out of place in his Sonata. From one movement to the next, the music demands a performance from the soloist of ever-more diabolical virtuosity: the first movement is a kind of reverie, the second, a scherzo, gives way to a merciless toccata and fugue in the final movement, which eases off only at the end with a magnificent Brahmsian-Russian chorale. German pianist Sontraud Speidel (born in 1944, a follower of Yvonne Loriod and Géza Anda) has made something of a speciality of rarer, more modern repertoires – Eugen d’Albert, Lachner, Fanny Mendelssohn, Reinecke, Kirchner – and she can boast a very full discography. She is also a much-sought-after teacher all over the world, from Tanglewood to the University of Montreal; from California State University to the University of Taipei; and from the Royal Academy to the Menuhin Music School. © SM/Qobuz