Schnittke: Complete music for cello and piano

Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
The combination of cello and piano has been key to Schnittke's blossoming reputation, especially given the frequency with which the Cello Sonata No. 1 gets performed. Here Irina Schnittke, the composer's widow (he died in the summer of 1998), plays with bruising key pressure, tremendous sustain, and limpid grace, from the classical tinges of the first section to the slammed clusters of the second section to the fade of the third. Schnittke had Mstislav Rostropovich in mind for Cello Sonata No. 2, with its long, slowly wavering lines and mid-to-low register range. Irina Schnittke matches Alexander Ivashkin's dense cello reflections with chromatic bursts and falling trails of off-center notes. The short Musica Nostalgica, recorded here for the first time, was dedicated to Rostropovich and is a short, bittersweet miniature. Closing the CD is the 26-minute Epilogue from the ballet Peer Gynt, which Schnittke brilliantly scored for a taped chorus, cello, and foreshadow-rich piano. Again displaying the composer's imagination to be filled with points of crashing impact, the piece operates on the hinge of elaborately built, somber power and emotive blocks of energy that throw Ivashkin's soaring cello against disembodied choral floats. --Andrew Bartlett

Tracks:

Cello Sonata No. 1: I Largo
Cello Sonata No. 1: II Presto
Cello Sonata No. 1: III Largo
Cello Sonata No. 2: I Senza tempo
Cello Sonata No. 2: II Allegro
Cello Sonata No. 2: III Largo
Cello Sonata No. 2: IV Allegro
Cello Sonata No. 2: V Lento
Musica nostalgica
Epilogue From The Ballet 'Peer Gynt'

Amazon.com

The combination of cello and piano has been key to Schnittke's blossoming reputation, especially given the frequency with which the Cello Sonata No. 1 gets performed. Here Irina Schnittke, the composer's widow (he died in the summer of 1998), plays with bruising key pressure, tremendous sustain, and limpid grace, from the classical tinges of the first section to the slammed clusters of the second section to the fade of the third. Schnittke had Mstislav Rostropovich in mind for Cello Sonata No. 2, with its long, slowly wavering lines and mid-to-low register range. Irina Schnittke matches Alexander Ivashkin's dense cello reflections with chromatic bursts and falling trails of off-center notes. The short Musica Nostalgica, recorded here for the first time, was dedicated to Rostropovich and is a short, bittersweet miniature. Closing the CD is the 26-minute Epilogue from the ballet Peer Gynt, which Schnittke brilliantly scored for a taped chorus, cello, and foreshadow-rich piano. Again displaying the composer's imagination to be filled with points of crashing impact, the piece operates on the hinge of elaborately built, somber power and emotive blocks of energy that throw Ivashkin's soaring cello against disembodied choral floats. --Andrew Bartlett

Customer Reviews:

VERY BEAUTIFUL.......2006-10-31

I have played the Schnittke Sonata No.1 myself in a recital some years ago, and therefore can say, that this recording is the most beautiful I have gone through during my preparations. It is not only the extremely beautiful sound of the cello (very well recorded too) - and of course the piano, but also the refined interpretation. By the way, I have so far never bought any "bad" CD of Mr. Ivashkin....
Go for this CD/music, it is beautiful and - I strongly believe- important to know!

no title.......2006-07-18

This is my favorite CD. The two cello sonatas are brilliant, I will defer to the previous reviewer as he did a fine job briefly describing them. Musical nostalgica is altogether uninteresting as a composition, and not performed very well here. I'm just not a huge fan of his Suite im alten Stille, and this is adapted from it's Menuett. I will, however, disagree with the previous viewer that the Epilogue for Peer Gynt is less than impressive. I find that it illuminates the subtlety of the original composition and provides a less bombastic variation. I particularly enjoy the two "climaxes" that don't quite climax, and the end that vanishes into the barely audible choral background. This version displays a frailty and ephemeral humanity that makes this the track I listen to the most. If I am trying to expose someone else to the genius of Schnittke, then I certainly choose his second cello sonata, or his third string quartet (amongst others), but this recording of the Epilogue From The Ballet 'Peer Gynt' remains my favorite piece of music.

Great cello sonatas, but the rest is less impressive.......2003-12-16

This disc is a logical one: the complete cello and piano music of Schnittke, with his widow playing piano and his biographer the cello. The two cello sonatas are amongst the composer's best works, and the performers' understanding of Schnittke's music makes this disc a clear first choice for them.

The First Cello Sonata is one of Schnittke's most recorded pieces. In a largely conservative musical language that may remind many listeners of Shostakovitch and Prokofiev, it lays out a very clear argument: a brief introductory opening movement followed by a ferocious scherzo and a long, elegiac finale. The performance here is quite stunningly intense, and it can be comfortably recommended over any rivals I have heard.

The Second Cello Sonata, though, may be the finer work. More modernist in atmoshpere, its five quizzical, brief movements never seeming quite to cohere, it eventually tails off into silence. Some listeners might be reminded of Webern, though Schnittke never abandons tonality in the way the Austrian composer did--nor does he have Webern's intensity of focus. This isn't easy listening, but it's a work that grows upon the listener with repeated hearings. Once again, the performance is all one could wish for.

I'm less impressed by the fillups on the disc. Musical nostalgica is fake salon music with a twist, while the Epilogue is a reduction for tape, cello and piano of the epiloge of Schnittke's symphonyically conceived ballet, Peer Gynt. Unfortunately, two things make this version less successful than the original: firstly, due to the episodic nature of the Epilogue, it really helps to have heard the rest of the ballet first (almost all the material in the Epilogue is recycling of music from the preceding acts); secondly piano and cello just can't match an orchestra for the range of colour or the weight of the (often enormous) climaxes in the work.