Shostakovich dedicated the third movement of his Viola Sonata "to the great Beethoven" and called the music "muzyka svetlaya" (radiant music), despite its often sinister allusions.
Instruments
The arpeggione, for which Schubert wrote his sonata, had six strings bowed like a bass viol but tuned like a guitar, and its sound was described as melancholic, with a high register similar to an oboe and a low register like a basset-horn.
Composition History
Ödön Pártos, a Hungarian-born composer who studied with Zoltán Kodály, wrote his work "Yizkor (In Memoriam)" two years after World War II, while he was principal violist of the Palestine Orchestra.
Composition History
Shostakovich's Viola Sonata was his final completed work, written in the early summer of 1975 while he was ravaged by cancer, and he died shortly after its completion.
Performer Biography
Amihai Grosz, the violist on this album, began his career as a founding member of the Jerusalem Quartet before becoming the principal violist with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra.
Composition History
Schubert's Arpeggione Sonata was written for the arpeggione, an instrument invented in 1823 that was "stillborn" and is now only remembered through this masterpiece.
Performer Biography
Sunwook Kim, the pianist on this album, won the prestigious Leeds International Piano Competition in 2006 at just eighteen, becoming its youngest winner in forty years and its first Asian winner.
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Visages
Viola in Exile
Schubert: Arpeggione Sonata, D. 821 & Lieder ohne Worte for Viola and Piano
Melodies
Shostakovich: Cello Sonata in D Minor, Op. 40 & Viola Sonata, Op. 147
Music for Viola and Piano by Shostakovich, Stravinksy, Glazunov
Bela Bartok, Manuel De Falla, Rebecca Clarke, Robert Schumann & Zoltán Kódaly: Märchenbilder - Meisterwerke Für Viola Und Klavier (Fairy Tale Pictures - Masterworks for Viola and Piano)
