I was thinking about Brahms this morning as I was getting ready to go to a rehearsal of his Piano Quintet (with pianist Cary Lewis and the Arnica String Quartet – we’ll be performing it on Wednesday, February 6 at Noon in the Old Church, Portland).
As a violist, I have a long standing love affair with Brahms, prickly though he may be to some, since he treats our instrument so lovingly and with such respect. I often wonder if those who dislike him happen to play the piano, to which he is not always so kind.
One of the recordings that I happened on to quite a while ago (while listening to a classical radio station) and almost immediately fell in love with was the DG recording of the three violin sonatas performed by violinist Augustin Dumay and pianist Maria João Pires.
The G major Sonata is especially lovely, and I’m posting an excerpt as an antidote to all of the recent anti-Brahms sentiment that’s been going around in the blogosphere lately.
[audio:brahms1_1.mp3]
You can purchase this recording as a download from the DG web store.