Tim Horton - Brahms Sonatas for Viola & Piano (2011)

With the completion of the String Quintet op. 111 in 1890, Brahms had decided to retire from composition. “For my entire life I’ve been a hard worker; now for once I’m going to be lazy,” he was quoted as saying. Due to a chance meeting with the great clarinetist Richard Mühlfeld, however, we not only have the Trio op. 114, Quintet op. 115 and the two Sonatas op. 120, but also the late Piano Pieces op. 116-119 and the Vier Ernste Gesänge. Brahms himself rewrote the clarinet sonatas for viola and piano.

On this recording from LAWO Classics we hear violist Henninge Landaas in brilliant collaboration with English pianist Tim Horton. The sonatas for viola are regarded today as works in their own right, but there is no getting away from the fact that every theme, every extended interval, every colour was conceived with Mühlfeld’s extraordinary playing in mind. Rather than asking which version is more satisfying, however, one can explore how the viola shows different aspects of the same music, thereby gaining yet more insight into the musical imagination of one of humanity’s great geniuses.