Alina Ibragimova and Cédric Tiberghien are one of the most formidable teams in the world today. Their Wigmore Hall Live Beethoven series was sensational, form first note to last. I must say I was surprised to receive this two CD set of the violin/piano music of Schubert. Curiously, this combination never inspired him to the same sublime heights as the two Piano Trios, the late quartets or the two quintets, as different as they are from each other. This music has never really been accepted into the mainstream repertoire (a bit like Dvorák’s Violin Concerto). Mono recordings on LP by the now forgotten Max Rostal and Colin Horsley and Johanna Martzy still change hands for astronomical sums, for reasons no one has ever quite explained.
 
Listening to these performances certainly inspired me to reevaluate them. Perhaps Diabelli is to blame, as it was his idea to publish them as Sonatinas, thereby emphasising their appeal to amateurs but trivialising it for everyone else. While the D Major Sonata D384 is Schubert in his gemütlich Biedermeier mood, the two minor key ones are quite substantial and as long as many of Beethoven’s works in this genre. The A Minor especially presents a kaleidoscopic array of moods and expression, all of which Ibragimova and Tiberghien convey beautifully. They invest it with plenty of drama and fireworks here with leaps between registers as well as a none too subtle homage to the fast section of the Countess’s Dove sono aria in Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro.
 
The work that transfixed me was the Fantasy in C Major, premiered in 1828, the year of the composer’s death. This is a consciously virtuoso work full of confidence and flamboyance with both violinist and pianist in their elements. This set is a revelation. Buy it!
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