"Wigmore Hall Live -J.S.Bach, Brahms, Britten, etc : Perenyi, Varjon"

Wigmore Hall Live - Miklos Perenyi

BACH: Suite No. 3 in C major BWV1009 solo cello
BRITTEN: Cello Sonata in C major Op. 65
BRAHMS: Cello Sonata No. 2 in F major Op. 99
Encore - CHOPIN: Cello Sonata in G minor Op. 65 III: Largo

Miklos Perenyi, cello
Denes Varjon, piano

Recorded live at Wigmore Hall, 27 January 2009

Miklos Perenyi opens the programme with Bach’s Solo Suite No 3. For Perenyi, the Bach Suites “represent a vast interpretative challenge. In any given moment there are so many different aspects requiring a decision, above all in the linear polyphonies, and at every point we have to make our own judgement.”

The closing work in the programme is Brahms’ expansive Sonata No 2 in F major, which is preceded by the Sonata in C that Benjamin Britten composed for Mstislav Rostropovich and premiered with the Russian cellist in 1961.

Denes Varjon, who studied chamber performance with Gyorgy Kurtag, relishes the challenge of following in the footsteps of Britten, whom he describes as “a fantastic pianist”, while Perenyi observes that: “Each movement is very economical, and seems to be on a small scale, but each is a major intellectual and aesthetic achievement.”

The encore presented by Perenyi and Varjon is the Largo from the Chopin’s Cello Sonata in G minor - a work that Perenyi first played at the age of 14, and which featured with Schumann and Kodaly on his first-ever LP, recorded in the mid-1960s when he was still a teenager. ( Wigmore Hall )