Martha Argerich and Renaud Capuçon: It’s an exciting stage duo. In terms of age, the two are almost two generations apart, completely different musical worlds could collide. But both are thoroughbred chamber musicians.
If the Argerich, literally “with links”, in the opening movement of Beethoven’s Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 8 in G major makes the rolling basses stand out like small lightning bolts, one would not believe it: the lady is 79. Next to it, Capuçon, 44 : In Beethoven’s sonata, his piano partner tends to pull him in. It is also in the nature of this genre, at that time people still spoke of piano sonatas with violin.
concert
Martha Argerich, R. Capucon
Salzburg, house for Mozart
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But it wasn’t as if Argerich was holding a grandson by the hand like a kind grandmother: She still flickered in sheer girlish energy. These active forces visibly carried away the violinist, who set to work with a silky fine tone.
César Franck’s Gassenhauer par excellence, the A major sonata, is of a different nature: The violinist is asked first. Capuçon is a first-rate stylist, he formulates the themes as openly as possible, which enabled Argerich to connect with special numbers: a rendering that is far removed from the ragged image that characterizes the work. In between Prokofiev’s Second Sonata in D major: mixed, because the motor skills want to be played out as well as the melodic offerings, and both of these are by no means straightforward in these four movements. A volcano on the piano, a stylist on the violin, that was the recipe here.
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