Kancheli: V & V for violin and taped voice with string orchestra
Rachmaninov: Vocalise, Op. 34 No. 14
Shostakovich: Violin Concerto No. 1 in A minor, Op. 99, Lyric Waltz (Dances of the Dolls)
Lisa Batiashvili’s debut album for DG, ‘Echoes of Time’, is a matter of the heart - Lisa focuses her program on composers whose lives and work have been heavily influenced by the political happenings in former Soviet Union. Inspired by personal experience, Lisa, herself, went into German exile with her family during the political upheaval in Georgia in 1991.
The program spans the whole of the 20th century, classics by Shostakovich ‘Waltz from the Doll’s Dances’ and Rachmaninov’s ever popular ‘Vocalise’, are combined with Georgian composer, Giya Kancheli’s ‘V and V’, and Estonian, Arvo Pärt’s ‘Spiegel im Spiegel’. ‘Spiegel im Spiegel’ was written shortly before the composer went into exile.
For Pärt’s ‘Spiegel im Spiegel’ and Rachmaninov’s ‘Vocalise’ Lisa teams up with one of our DG’s most distinctive pianists, Hélène Grimaud. Esa-Pekka Salonen conducts the Symphonie orchester des bayerischen.
“few if any [recordings of the Shostakovich] are finer than this one...Batiashvili's reflective, almost weightless approach in the opening Nocturne...is rendered more distinctive by the resonant acoustic of the empty Herkulessaal...the passacaglia is exceptionally poised and the cadenza more sheerly musical than usual. The finale whizzes to its end without undue triumphalism.” - Gramophone Magazine (Disc of the Month)
“It's a marvellous performance [of the Shostakovich], suitably crepuscular in the opening "Nocturne", before a Gypsy flamboyance takes over for "Scherzo". Salonen proves the perfect accomplice in realising the album's theme of works reflective of the Soviet era, the programme including pieces by Soviet emigrés Arvo Pärt and Giya Kancheli” - The Independent ****
