JAVS Spring 2013

“Easy listening” it ain’t, but definitely worth the effort: this is some of the most intense music written in the past few decades, and Kashkashian has inter nalized every detail of Kurtág’s concentrated scores—that can include more words of instruction than notes—so that in her hands they sound as nat ural as a folk song or a nursery rhyme. The six movements of Ligeti’s Sonata were also com posed piece-meal, between 1991 and 1994, but together they form a monumental modern counter part to Bach’s unaccompanied string masterpieces. There exist masterful recordings of this piece by Tabea Zimmermann (who first performed the com plete work in 1994), Garth Knox (who premiered Loop , the first part to be completed, in 1991), Zimmermann’s disciple Antoine Tamestit, and Lawrence Power. Now Kashkashian joins them with a highly personal performance that transcends the printed page and sounds completely at home in the piece’s several different idioms, be it the gypsy-like C-string meditations of the Hora Lungă , the swing ing Loop , or the obsessive Chaconne chromatique . ECM’s lifelike recording brings Kashkashian as it were into one’s own music room. Her tone, which can reach almost unbearable heights of expressive ness, is faithfully captured within a warm acoustic.

Ad Index AVS History & Reference Guide . . . . . . . . . . 42 Balmforth Violas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67 Catskills Viola Retreat . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Charles E. Harman, Luthier . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 Connolly & Co., Inc.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . BC David Dalton Competition ad . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Domain Forget . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

International Viola Congress . . . . . . . . . . . . IBC Potter Violin Company . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Primrose International Viola Archive . . . . . . . 78 Primrose International Viola Competition . . IFC Robertson & Sons Violin Shop, Inc.. . . . . . . . 50 San Francisco Conservatory of Music . . . . . . . 68

J OuRNAL OF THE AMERICAN VIOLA SOCIETy 82