Beethoven: Violin Sonatas Nos 5 and 9 (arr for clarinet and cello)
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Beethoven: Violin Sonatas Nos 5 and 9 (arr for clarinet and cello) > Reviews > for the person who has everything

1CD(s) - Label:Classics - Distributor:BMG UK - Released:06/1997 - 743214331125

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for the person who has everything


Author's product rating:   Beethoven: Violin Sonatas Nos 5 and 9 (arr for clarinet and cello) - rated by Alberich

Originality  
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Value for Money  

Advantages: a new take on a familiar warhorse
Disadvantages: is it worth full price?

Recommend to potential buyers: yes 

Full review
It's unlikely that any music lover who has a good recording of Beethoven's violin concerto on CD (say: Perlman, Grumiaux or Szigeti) would ever say to him or herself: 'boy, I wonder what that sounds like on the clarinet'. In fact, the only people who might would be clarinetists, for they tend to feel (mistakenly, as it happens)that there just isn't enough original repertoire written for their instrument. So here, spanking new, is a Deutsche Grammophon CD offering us an original work in Mozart's Clarinet Concerto and an arrangement of the Beethoven prepared by Russian pianist/conductor Mikhail Pletnev. The soloist is Michael Collins, who plays the familiar Mozart on his basset horn with all the joy and panache we expect. The Beethoven is a different cup of tea. It's difficult to listen to the famous melodies without hearing the fiddle (or even the piano, Beethoven was, after all, a pianist himself and hated to see a good tune go unplayed by himself) but after a while, when the first shock wears off, the thing actually works quite well. Pletnev did have to make concessions, of course, a little transposition here, a minor rewrite there, but on the whole Beethoven's Clarinet Concerto (as the booklet cheerfully bills it)is a totally credible addition to the repertoire. It comes too late, unfortunately, for the great Gervase de Peyer, but it will be snapped up quite happily by the likes of Sabine Meyer and other relative youngsters.
That said, I suspect the names Pletnev and Collins made it imperative for this recording to be issued on a full-price luxury label like DG. As a curiosity (which it will always be, in spite of its quality) it might have more logically appeared on something like Naxos or Arte Nova. Still: recommended!
 
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