Review: French Impressions
vivienne
vivienne
CLASSICAL
JOSHUA BELL; JEREMY DENK
French Impressions (Sony)
NOT many violinists play with the finesse and spotless technique Joshua Bell shows so consistently in everything he records. Both Saint-Saëns and Ravel are beneficiaries here with the former's Violin Sonata No. 1 beautifully aerated; the quicksilver finale is especially fleet with reserves of facility barely tapped. Pianist Jeremy Denk emulates Bell's "gravity free" elegant ways, as Denk comments in his perceptive notes about French music. Ravel's Violin Sonata scores well too as its bluesy centrepiece is ideally caught and the echoes of his jazzy Piano Concerto No. 1 is affectionately recalled elsewhere.
Cesar Franck's Violin Sonata is a weightier affair, though, its cyclic moods needing deeper, darker hues and its finale more the feeling of sunrise than cleared mist. Still, if you want this great work with less rhetoric than usual, this one will fill the bill. Three and a half stars
-- James Manishen
