BEETHOVEN: Cello Sonata in C Major, Op. 102, No. 1; Cello Sonata in D Major, OP. 102, No. 2; 6 Bagatelles, Op. 126; Cello Sonata in A Major, Op. 69 – Tanya Tomkins, cello/Eric Zivian, fortepiano – Bridge 9305, 77:47 [Distr. by Albany] ****:
A star pupil of Baroque and early music specialist Anner Bylsma, Tanya Tomkins performs three Beethoven cello sonatas (rec. June 1008) on a Classical cello made by Joseph Panormo, London, 1811. The relatively brittle sound of the fortepiano comes to us via Edwin Beunk in Enschede, the Netherlands, who restored an 1815 instrument by Salvatore Lagrassa, Vienna. Composed in 1815, the two “free sonatas” for cello seem to provide a transition between the late piano sonatas the late quartets. Exemplary in their compression, the sonatas reveal the economy of means in the Op. 95 String Quartet. Once the C Major Sonata begins, it has hardly provided an exposition before everything changes into a winter storm. Octaves and obsessive triplets ask much of the cello, who must also apply vivid accents. A peremptory coda leads to a brief Adagio, more a musical interlude whose keyboard ornaments progress against a groaning scale from the cello. A longing melody emerges for both instruments, but the consolation is brief. Coordinated trills lead to the Allegro vivace, a virtuosic series of leaping impulses bound to the original motif from movement one.
The declamatory opening of the D Major Sonata conveys an antique sound, the 16th notes filigree almost a call to Bach or Handel. The sonata-form evolution of this Allegro con brio likes to jar our senses with sudden onrushes of energy, nimbly shadowed in the keyboard. The broken chord patterns in the keyboard might owe something to the French style. The fierce coda comes down on a resounding thump. The Adagio is rare in Beethoven: a fully worked out movement in D Minor in the manner of an evolving chorale that assumes increased ornamentation as it proceeds. Suddenly, a lullaby in D Major ensues, with rocking figures from the keyboard. The melody soars to an anguished pitch, then at the coda slows into spiritual entropy, a slow cadenza over a dominant chord. The final Allegro opens a bit like the finale to the First Symphony, with false starts: then a double fugue of intricate, often dissonant, complexity follows that rivals the counterpoint we find in the Hammerklavier Sonata. The sound of the period instruments adds to the askew luster of the piece, its grainy and incisive wit.
The Op. 126 set of Six Bagatelles (1823-1824) continue the composer’s fascination with what he called “kleinigkeiten,” brief character pieces that exploit melodic or rhythmic kernels for their laconic possibilities. This cycle, after the first in G Major, descends in key a major third, and the second in G Minor has all the passionate earmarks of a Bach invention. The No. 3 in E-flat Major has a noble, processional vigor and an elastic trill. The ferocious No. 4 in B Minor, a virile scherzo, contains the Dionysiac Beethoven capacity to dance and explode at once. The period instrument, again, captures the disparate registers with compelling sonority. No. 5 in G Major is marked Quasi allegretto in 6/8 and maintains a gentle, pastoral character. The last, in cut time, reverts to E-flat Major, and opens and concludes with a wild flurry; after the introduction, it then settles down in laendler fashion, a stylized country dance.
The A Major (1808) is the only piece in this collection that suffers invidious comparison with non-period instruments. I have become too used to the throes of Rostropovich-Richter, Feuermann-Hess, and Piatagorsky-Solomon to abandon my prejudices for modern instruments in this, the grandest of the Beethoven cello sonatas. Still, given Beethoven’s equal distribution of the parts and the often plaintive tone from Tomkins, the innate beauty and visceral excitement of the piece shines through, especially when both players move in full fettle. The scale of the first movement is huge, comparable to the opening movement of the Archduke Trio. The A Minor Scherzo loves its syncopations, the structure–given two appearances of the trio–parallel to that of the Seventh and Ninth symphonies and inspirational to Schumann. A truncated aria for a third movement, Adagio cantabile, segues into the brisk, eminently seamless rendition of the Finale: Allegro vivace.
Given the period instruments and the participants’ level of execution, we can well glean Beethoven’s raising of the cello sonata to an independent status worthy of the highest musical ideals.
–Gary Lemco
