Violin Concerto: Mutter(Vn)Masur / Nyp +schumann: Fantasie

This disc was nominated for the 1999 Grammy Award for "Best Instrumental Soloist(s) Performance with Orchestra."
Anne-Sophie Mutter is perhaps the greatest violinist of her generation, and in her new recording of the Brahms Violin Concerto she gives a more mature--though no less resplendent--performance of the work than her equally eloquent traversal with Herbert von Karajan in the mid-1980s. Apart from the magnificent fury of the work's famous cadenza-like entry in the opening Allegro, the Adagio--with its serene melody for solo oboe against a background of woodwinds and horns--is perhaps the most well-loved of the work's movements. The closing Allegro opens with a stirring theme which highlights the composer's love of Hungarian gypsy music. Infectious and proceeding with a virtuosic momentum, this movement closes with an increase in the pulse of the music and an exciting and emphatic support from the orchestra.
Robert Schumann's Fantasie for Violin and Orchestra is a little-known bravura showpiece. The legendary violinist Joseph Joachim requested a work "out of the deep shaft" of the composer's genius. Schumann dashed off this brilliant but deeply felt work within a week's time and it remained in Joachim's repertoire until his death.