Franz Schubert (1797-1828)
Sonate pour violon et piano en ré majeur, D384
Sonate pour violon et piano en la mineur, D 385
Sonate pour violon et piano en sol mineur, D 408
Sonate pour violon et piano en la majeur, D 574

Zefira Valova, violon
Aapo Häkkinen, piano

La production de tout compositeur donne lieu à des oeuvres d'inégal intérêt. Les sommets de la création de chacun peuvent avoir des formes de prédilection et d'autres qui les inspirent moins. On ne retrouve pas dans ces quatre Sonates écrites pour le duo piano-violon le lyrisme bouleversant des Sonates ou Impromptus pour le piano seul, leurs confidences fraternelles, les épanchements abandonnés. Est-ce le jeune âge du musicien, le contexte de l'écriture, la destination de la commande, ce Schubert ci laisse quelque fois entendre une mélancolie chantante, comme dans l'Allegro de la Sonate en ré D 384, mais pas l'élégie enfiévrée qui suscitait la plus profonde sympathie. Parfois des accents joyeux évoquent une fête et rappellent le compositeur émouvant et bienaimé et c'est notamment le cas de la Sonate en la D574, la dernière sur le disque, mais souvent on croit entendre un divertissement de salon, quelque peu conventionnel. Mais peut-être doit-on éviter de comparer des oeuvres plus simples ou moins ambitieuses avec les monuments impérissables qui dominent dans nos souvenirs émus ? Les deux interprètes jouent dans une parfaite entente, leur réalisation talentueuse défend ces oeuvres peu jouées avec un engagement irréprochable. Zefira Valova joue un violon florentin de Lorenzo et Tomaso Carcassi de 1760, Aapo Häkkinen, un pianoforte viennois de Daniel Dörr daté de 1820. (Alain Letrun)

Sparkling new accounts of Schubert’s violin-and-piano music from two luminaries of the Finnish period-instrument scene. The Bulgarian violinist Zefira Valova graduated from the National Music Academy of her native Sofia, Bulgaria, before specialising in Baroque violin studies with Lucy van Dael. While still based in her homeland, having founded Bulgaria’s only annual early-music festival (Sofia Baroque Arts Festival) she is a frequent soloist with and guest leader of the Helsinki Baroque Orchestra under its founder-director Aapo Häkkinen, who swaps the conductor’s platform on this occasion for a seat at a gentle, plangent-sounding fortepiano from 1820 of Viennese manufacture – ideally suited to the repertoire at hand. Together they make a lively and sympathetic partnership, informed by playing these youthful works in concert. Franz Schubert (1797-1828) was just 19 years old when he wrote a trio of sonatas in the spring of 1816, but he already had four symphonies under his belt as well as masterpieces of song such as Gretchen am Spinnrade and Erlkönig. Like so much of his music, they were only published after his death, when they were given both a misleading opus number (Op.137) and even title, for the diminutive ‘sonatina’ nomenclature shows little respect for both the scale of Schubert’s imagination and handling of form. On a technical level, the trio of pieces lies within the ambit of amateur players of both instruments, though more demanding for the pianist. This relative ease of execution need not obscure the rapturous melodies of the second work in the collection, D385, or its deeply felt harmonies, which culminate in an elegiac finale. By comparison, D384 is a work of sparkling good humour, melodically reminiscent of Mozart, and blessed with seemingly effortless charm. Cast in the turbulent Erlkönig key of G minor, D408 turns the listener’s ear towards Beethoven, though the concise opening melody clearly speaks with Schubert’s voice. However, all three of these ‘sonatinas’ are somewhat overshadowed by the Sonata D574 from the summer of the following year, 1817, which ranks among the most inspired productions of even Schubert’s prodigious youth. While great violinists such as Josef Suk and Arthur Grumiaux once lavished their care over these works, they have been comparatively neglected in recent years, making this new recording using the instruments and techniques of Schubert’s time all the more welcome.