Naxos has been busy
launching an all-out campaign on behalf of Szymanowski’s violin
works. A companion disc, played by Ilya Kaler, is devoted to
the Concertos and has the Fitelberg orchestration of the Notturno
and Tarantella. And now in the chamber sphere we have this recital
by Miriam Kramer and Nicholas Durcan, which has two centres
of gravity – the Sonata and Mythes.
Kramer and Durcan
have some decided views in this repertoire, ones that take them
broadly to the edge of orthodoxy. Let’s take the Sonata. In
the generous, perhaps over-generous, acoustic of Potton Hall
– there’s audible pedal noise - we have here a very determined
and measured account. A pretty standard first movement would
take about ten minutes; that’s what Piotr Pławner
and Waldemar Malicki take on Dux 02087. Lydia Mordkovich and
Marina Gusak-Grin take almost exactly the same time on Chandos.
Kramer takes a minute longer; she takes an equally slow tempo
in the second movement and is still operating on a more measured
basis in the finale. This is part of a well-defined and consistently
held approach.
Tonally she strikes
a mid point between the incandescent grandiosity of Mordkovich
and the more aristocratic restraint of Pławner,
who prefers a more aloof profile and tighter rhythms
– less rhapsodic in effect. Mordkovich’s guttural and febrile
response is tremendously exciting but occasionally overpowering,
especially in her boomy Chandos acoustic. The recording level
also plays tricks on Kramer who sounds too loud at the start
of the central movement – not enough tranquilo e dolce
– and Durcan tends to underplay the rapture from time to time.
Pławner’s finale generates
heat, maybe too much in the piano part; Kramer sticks to her
guns and prefers a measured course. Mordkovich happily bisects
both positions.
These pointers –
or strictures – apply throughout. I find Kramer’s playing of
the Notturno and Tarantella very inconsistent. The former is
perfectly decent – a reasonable tempo, good tone colours – but
she strikes a very deliberate pose in the Tarantella which is
ruinously slow. One doesn’t have to whip things up à la Mordkovich
(4:53) but to take six and a half minutes rather flies in the
face of the Presto appassionato indication. Mythes
is a much more difficult work to put across. She takes La
Fontaine d’Arethuse and makes it more disembodied than usual
but she’s less atmospheric than Pławner
in Narcisse. Mordkovich is terribly fast in Dryades
et Pan, Pławner’s
better whilst Kramer plays beautifully in places but is inclined
to be static. The other works conform more or less to these
views except that Kramer is actually quicker than Pławner in the Romance.
As one can tell Kramer and Durcan have strongly
personalised views in this repertoire. My preferences are for
the more aristocratic but sensitive Pławner
and for the high voltage generated by Mordkovich.
Jonathan Woolf
Miriam Kramer (violin)
