Elina Vähälä / Lahti Symphony Orchestra / Jaakko Kuusisto THE RED VIOLIN

Jaakko Kuusisto may be one of his generation’s leading violin virtuosos but he features here as composer and conductor, leaving the pyrotechnics to the phenomenally talented Elina Vähälä (aka Mrs Ralf Gothóni). And what a show she puts on here, in two full-blooded 21st-century concertos of Romantic, or at least conventional, idiom, rich in melody, orchestral texture and expressive purpose.

Corigliano’s Concerto will be familiar to many, having been both assembled from the music to Girard’s film The Red Violin in 1997 and in part the progenitor to it. Corigliano pre-composed the opening Chaconne as an independent work so that the actors had a piece they could mime to in the film, but in 2003 added three further movements, including a magical Pianissimo Scherzo, to make a full-size concerto that his namesake father – former concertmaster of the New York Philharmonic – would have liked to play. Vähälä’s vibrant account is a match for Bell’s – and three minutes faster in the Chaconne – and fleeter and more exciting throughout, with superior sound, than Ludwig on Naxos. (In the Chaconne, Vähälä outpaces Chloë Hanslip, too, but expressively matters are more even here.) Kuusisto’s own Concerto (2011) is a colourful and dramatic score, although he has confessed to no extramusical inspiration. The original idea was for a concertante work using unusual and electronic instruments but over time it transformed into the present vivacious half-hour-long concerto of relatively conventional stamp. The finale’s rhythmic drive and alternating lyricism are immensely appealing. The disc opens with the playful overture Leika (‘Child’s Play’, 2010 – not the similarly-named Soviet space dog). Excellent performances and sound. (Guy Rickards / Gramophone)

Elina Vähälä / Niek De Groot DUOS FOR VIOLIN AND DOUBLE BASS

Dutch double bassist Niek de Groot is one of today's leading soloists. Originally a trumpet-player he started playing the double-bass at 18. Within an unusually short time he became principal bass with several European ensembles, including a 10 year tenure as first solo-bass with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra.

After his formal studies he further developed his skills at the Banff Centre for the Arts, Canada. Niek's playing has benefited a great deal also from attending masterclasses with eminent cellists Frans Helmerson, Lluìs Claret, Laurence Lesser and in collaborations with Leonard Bernstein, György Sebök and Mstislav Rostropovich. 

Since 2006 Niek de Groot has dedicated himself entirely to chamber music and solo performances. He performs regularly as a soloist and chamber musician at the best known concerthalls and music festivals. A new well received solo CD for NIMBUS was released in 2015. The first volume of the Hoffmeister solo-quartets and Rossini sonatas for BIS-records was released in 2017. The second volume will arrive later in 2018. A new recording with contemporary violin/bass Duos for AUDITE is on the market since February 2018.  His repertoire includes a great deal of contemporary music and he has worked closely with composers such as Kurtág, Stockhausen, Saariaho, Vasks and Gubaidulina.

​For this recording, Finnish violinist Elina Vähälä and Dutch double bass player Niek de Groot have chosen and performed seven pieces, composed by six Europeans and one Korean. When a violin and a double bass come together, two sound spheres collide: particularly in recent times, many renowned composers have been inspired to create highly original realisations of such encounters.

Liza Ferschtman / Het Gelders Orkest / Kees Bakels FELIX MENDELSSOHN Violin Concerto, Op. 64 - String Octet, Op. 20

Liza Ferschtman:….slowly, as my musical path kept unfolding, I got to the point where more and more I was able to let go of my preconceived notions about the Violin Concerto and more clearly start to see and hear my own voice in it. Over the years I got to know so much more music by Mendelssohn, from the inside out, and I felt the language become more fully my own. When working with Kees Bakels on it a couple of years ago things started to really fall into place, and last May when performing it with the Arnhem Philharmonic I really was all of a sudden struck by a distinct feeling that I can only describe as falling in love all over again with this magical piece. Certain details in the score seemed to appear completely new to me and the idea of approaching the work with the same collaborative energy as in chamber music made me experience it completely afresh. The combination of passion, grand emotions and at the same time lightness and elegance, such characteristic traits for Mendelssohn, fell completely into place. To feel this way about such a familiar piece was revelatory and I knew I wanted to share these discoveries, if you like, with many more people.

Elina Vähälä / Virtuosi di Kuhmo JOSEPH HAYDN Violin Concertos

Haydn's three surviving violin concertos (a fourth is lost but might still resurface) were probably composed between 1765 and 1770. The music from this portion of Haydn's career has lately been subjected to a major re-evalution that's all to the good, rescuing many works from the limbo of halfhearted performances. It's especially helpful in the case of these concertos, which were composed for Haydn's lead virtuoso at Esterháza, Luigi Tomasini (one of the manuscripts even bears the note "fatto per il Luigi," "done for Luigi"). Haydn was not a skilled violinist himself, and the works are not virtuosically conceived. But he likely had input from Tomasini, and the sizable Violin Concerto in A major, Hob. 7a/3, especially benefits from the gutsy approach adopted here by Finland's Virtuosi di Kuhmo and violinist Elina Vähälä, whose playful flair makes an attractive contrast with the rather hard-edged orchestral playing (made even harder-edged by church sound whose lack of naturalness can't be disguised by the high-tech super audio multichannel recording). Vähälä, who is nothing if not photogenic, is a fine Haydn interpreter with a strong sense of the composer's humor. Sample her confident playing in the finale of the Violin Concerto in G major, Hob. 7a/4, where the violin extracts a jolly line from the orchestra's mock-weighty quasi-fugal texture at the beginning. The booklet notes, in English and Finnish, are informative despite a few gaffes -- "empfindsam" is a misleading word for these works, which are sunny and bear no traces of the gloomy, dramatic music of C.P.E. Bach. On balance a strong outing that makes one eager to hear more of what will emerge as Finland's cadre of vigorous young performers take up more music of the Classical era. (James Manheim)