Josef Suk (1874-1935)
Four Pieces, Op.17 (1900)
Bohuslav Martinů (1890-1959)
Czech Rhapsody, H.307 (1945)
Violin Sonata No.1, H.182 (1929)
Luboš Fišer (1935-1999)
‘The Hands’, Violin Sonata (1961)
Daniel Matejča (violin)
Jan Schulmeister (piano)
rec. 2024/25, Studio 1 of Czech Radio
Supraphon SU4361-2 [54]

Violinist Daniel Matejča was Eurovision Young Musician 2022 and has already recorded such heavyweight repertoire as Ysaÿe’s solo Sonatas. His teacher was that outstanding exponent of the Czech school, Ivan Štraus, the long-time leader of the Suk Quartet. In 2023, the Matejča-Schulmeister duo won the chamber music prize at the Dvořák International Radio Competition Praga, and that prize was this recording, which is now being promoted by Supraphon. It bears the repertorial authority of his teacher, a notable exponent of Martinů and the first performer of Luboš Fišer’s The Hands.

Josef Suk’s Four Pieces is the only truly well-known music in the recital and of the four movements the Burleska is the one frequently extracted for performance. The Matejča-Schulmeister duo extol clarity and colour in the Quasi ballata though they could be a notch faster and more exciting still in the Appassionato. But the youthful pairing takes the Un poco triste at a bit of a lick and a slightly slower tempo would have allowed a greater quotient of expression – both Josef Suk and Pavel Šporcl agree on this slight relaxation, which makes all the difference. I feel too that the Burleska could be faster and more glittering, as it is with the two violinists mentioned. This is a young duo’s conception – fast music a touch measured, slow music not indulged. It doesn’t really do it for me, but it might do it for you.    

Martinů’s Czech Rhapsody was composed for Fritz Kreisler in 1945 but there’s no evidence that he played it. It has a radiant, fresh-air quality that is most appealing but not wholly distinctive of the composer at his most creative. Nevertheless, the duo plays it well, especially the sensitively shaped slower section toward the end of the work. This is a work that Štraus recorded, as indeed have Bohuslav Matoušek and Šporcl. The same composer’s First Sonata of 1929 comes from a different creative period in which he was immersed in European Dance music and Le Jazz Hot. It’s a three-movement 17-minute sonata that has cadential opportunities for the violinist and plenty of jazzy rhythms and contrapuntal vitality for the duo. The central movement surely reflects the influence of Ravel’s Sonata, premiered just a couple of years earlier. Those flattened blue notes and the strong sense of demotic are very distinctive whilst the finale is up-to-tempo, direct and excitingly dispatched. If I prefer Matoušek and Štraus himself, it’s for their tonal qualities and for their more relaxed tempo in the slow movement – Štraus especially.

When I last reviewed Fiser’s Sonata ‘The Hands’, over a decade ago, I called it a masterpiece. It was played there by Leoš Čepický (violin) and Ivan Klánský. I can’t add to what I wrote then, so I’ll reprise it here. ‘The Sonata was meant to be called Crux, an allegorical description of Christ’s suffering and resurrection, but the topic and title were hardly welcomed by the hard-line authorities so it became The Hands. It was written during Fišer’s Musica Nova period when he wrote the still-startling 15 Prints after Dürer’s Apocalypse and The Hands shares its abrasive sonic vehemence. But after the bloodthirsty and often tortured early passages, the resigned pizzicati and piano tolling lead to a strangely awe-inspiring radiance. It’s memorably played and, I think, something of a masterpiece.’ Matejča and Schulmeister’s performance is admirable if not quite, for me, the equal of that Nimbus pairing but it’s a work you should hear and at only eleven minutes it will reward your interest.

These young musicians have constructed a fine disc, though a relatively short one – they could have included another sonata – which has been well recorded and annotated. It serves notice of yet another excellent pairing in the Czech firmament though I won’t suggest that individually their performances are the best available.

Jonathan Woolf

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