Two Violas • Regeneration
Peter Mallinson (viola), Matthias Wiesner (viola)
Lynn Arnold (piano)
rec. 2024, St. Peter’s Church, Boughton Monchelsea, UK
Meridian CDE84684 [75]
In 2012, violists Peter Mallinson and Matthias Wiesner joined the BBC Symphony Orchestra. Since then, they have released three CDs of music written and arranged for two violas, sometimes accompanied (review ~ review). Regeneration, their new disc, has a wide chronological spread, from Orlando Gibbons in the early 17th century to pieces written in the past few years.
Bach’s sonata, originally for two violas da gamba, and Gibbons’s Fantasias are highly effective on two violas, with beautifully lyrical playing from the two soloists. Gibbons’s counterpoint is especially subtle, as Peter Mallinson points out in his notes, and the two players bring this out well. Less interesting is York Bowen’s Duo, charming but with little of the power of his better-known chamber works.
The name of Alexander Wunderer rang a bell but I only placed him when the notes reminded me that he was principal oboe of the Vienna Philharmonic. He wrote for instruments other than oboe. His Duett, a substantial work, opens with a typically Viennese Allegretto. More unusual is the central Presto section, marked gespenstig (ghostly). This takes the players through a variety of rhythmic and dynamic turns, which they handle with aplomb. The concluding section, also Allegretto, is somewhat more conservative, almost Brahmsian; Mallinson and Wiesner excel in the lyric elements here.
Of the four pieces from the 21st century, the most immediately appealing is Raymond Yiu’s Three Shidaiqu Transcriptions from 2019. Shidaiqu, a genre popular in Shanghai in the 1920s and 1930s, fused Western dance music with Chinese folk. The three pieces are all sad, as if a unique moment in musical history was dying away.
Somewhat similar in inspiration, also from 2019, is the multi-talented Pete Letanka’s Gershwinian Nostalgia. There is very idiomatic playing by the two violists. Sally Beamish’s Prelude and Canon has gone through several iterations since its composition in 2005. It is “inspired by the evocative world of Scottish fiddle and Highland bagpipes”. The combination of these factors with Baroque forms produces a showcase for the players.
Detlev Glanert is best known for his fine operas. The Pleiades from 2023 is on a very different scale, portraying the seven daughters of Atlas. It is fascinating to see Glanert work with such small forms.
Pianist Lynn Arnold accompanies the violists in several of these works. She is stylishly idiomatic in Letanka’s and Yiu’s works, and forceful and crystal clear in Bach’s Sonata. One must also mention her playing in Elgar’s The Wild Bears. These bears must be the fastest on earth.
This is a well-constructed and well-played addition to Mallinson and Wiesner’s Two Violas series.
William Kreindler
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Contents
J. S. Bach
Sonata in G minor, BWV 1029* (arr. Iain Farrington)
Sally Beamish
Prelude and Canon
Orlando Gibbons
Two Fantasias: Fantasia in F, Fantasia in B flat
Detlev Glanert
The Pleiades: Celaeno, Asterope, Alkyone, Elektra, Maia, Merope, Taygete
Raymond Yiu
Three Shidaiqu Transcriptions*
York Bowen
Duo in G major
Alexander Wunderer
Duett in G
Peter Letanka
Gershwinian Nostalgia*
Sir Edward Elgar
The Wild Bears* (arr. Dan Jenkins)
*with piano
