 Pédagogue émérite, compositeur prodigue Paul Hindemith était altiste mais pas seulement. Il maitrisait de multiples instruments (cuivres ou bois) et leur consacra d’ailleurs une série de sonates souvent accompagné d’un piano afin d’enrichir leur répertoire. Ses sonates pour violon op.11 datent de 1918 et témoignent déjà d’une maitrise de la forme tout en empruntant de façon évidente aux sonates de Schumann (Sonate n° 2). La « Petite » Sonate pour viole d’amour et piano op. 25 revendique son héritage baroque. Après 1930, le langage musical du compositeur se radicalise. La polyphonie se densifie. Harmonie et couleurs s’organisent selon des plans inédits à l’exemple des peintures d’un Kupka dont le credo était : « Couleurs, formes, dynamiques, on doit inventer et puis construire ». En bon artisan, Hindemith instille dans sa musique de chambre, ses deux Sonates isolées (1935–1939) en particulier, les principes de composition qu’il utilise dans ses œuvres orchestrales et vocales. (Trauermusik 1936). Toujours soucieux d’élargir le champ d’expression de chaque instrument il ne cesse aussi de s’inspirer des formes du passé (Prélude et Toccata du « Lebhaft » et la décoiffante triple fugue du « Ruhig Bewegt » de la Sonate en Do). Saluons les qualités du duo d’interprètes russes, Roman Mints (violon) et Alexander Kobrin (piano) : robustesse, véhémence, lyrisme et expressivité. Un disque magnifique. (Jérôme Angouillant) A new recording of Hindemith Complete Works for Violin & Piano together with Kleine Sonata for Viola D’Amore & Piano is released on Quartz Music on Friday 5 April. Featuring the multi-award-winning Russian musicians, violinist Roman Mints and pianist Alexander Kobrin. The album release is supported by a private launch concert on Thursday 4 April at The Savile Club in London. Passionate and avant-garde, with an extraordinary creative energy, Roman Mints is one of the most original violinists of his generation. He has long championed the work of contemporary composers and has given the Russian premières of works by Golijov, Tavener, MacMillan, Scelsi and Mozetich and world premières of over fifty works including compositions from Tabakova, Desyatnikov, Langer, Bennett, Irvine, Burrell, Vassiliev, Kurbatov and others. Roman Mints has had a lifelong love of the works of Paul Hindemith, which began when he was a young violinist, studying in Moscow in the 1980s. He says “This music, written not just before I was born but closer to the time of my grandparents’ birth, felt completely contemporary, and daringly advanced in its sound – and not just to me, as it turns out: 30 years on, Hindemith is still regarded by concert programmers as too difficult for the wider public. I put Sonata in D on the stand. I was gripped by the first subject, constructed from seconds and sevenths, marked to be played ‘with stony defiance’. I was never the same again and he became my window into contemporary music.” Roman Mints was born in Moscow and began playing the violin at the age of five. In 1994 he won a Foundation Scholarship to the Royal College of Music in London and also studied at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, winning prizes at each, alongside contemporaries Dobrinka Tabakova, Elena Langer, Maxim Rysanov and Kristina Blaumane. In 1998 Roman and his friend oboist Dmitry Bulgakov founded the highly respected Homecoming Chamber Music Festival which takes place annually in Moscow. He has recorded for ECM, Black Box, Quartz, Harmonia Mundi and other labels and his albums feature several world première recordings. Roman played on Dobrinka Tabikova’s Grammy-Award nominated album, String Paths. An album of solo violin music, Dance of Shadows, with an innovative recording approach invented by Roman and dubbed ‘spacial orchestration’, was a CD of the week at WQXR Radio New York, and on the annual wish list of Fanfare Magazine critics. This album was followed by the acclaimed 2016 Alfred Schnittke Works for Violin and Piano, with the pianist Katya Apekisheva. A world premiere symphonic recording of Desyatnikov Sketches To Sunset together with Russian Seasons was released in 2017, supervised and authorised by the composer; the album received a five star review in BBC Music Magazine, was longlisted for the BBC Music Magazine Awards 2018 and was also nominated for an ICMA Award. Roman Mints plays a Francesco Ruggieri violin, circa 1685. Pianist Alexander Kobrin has been called the ‘Van Cliburn of today’ by the BBC. He is amongst one of the foremost pianists of his generation, praised for his brilliant technique, musicality and emotional engagement with an audience. A critic wrote of his performance of Johannes Brahms’ Second Piano Concerto with the Syracuse Symphony, “This was a performance that will be revered and remembered as a landmark of the regeneration of exceptional classical music in Central New York". Alexander Kobrin has won numerous awards and performed with many of the major orchestras throughout the world, performing at the most prestigious concert halls. He has released recordings on the Harmonia Mundi, Quartz, and Centaur Records labels, covering a wide swath of the piano literature, to great critical acclaim.
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