Alina Ibragimova: Beethoven

The Strad Issue: July 2026

Description: A long-standing partnership returns fruitfully to Beethoven

Musicians: Alina Ibragimova (violin) Cédric Tiberghien (fortepiano)

Works: Beethoven: Violin Sonatas: op.12 nos.1–3, op.24 ‘Spring’

Catalogue number: BIS SACD2724

This release bears the first fruits of Alina Ibragimova’s maiden Beethoven project for BIS, whose engineers have responded with exemplary recorded sound (save for one gremlin in my review file of op.12 no.2’s first movement). She and Cédric Tiberghien consolidate their perceptive live Wigmore Hall recordings of more than a decade ago, combining striking technical dexterity, affective musicianship, instinctive spontaneity and admirable panache. They realise harmonic tensions intuitively and harness a wide range of colour, tone and dynamic, grading Beethoven’s sforzandos for appropriate emphasis and adding their own subtle nuances.

Their manipulation of the pulse and expressive timing are spot-on, allowing the music to breathe – sample, for instance, the liberties taken in the coda of op.12 no.2’s emotional central Andante.

Some tempos are on the slick side – semiquaver passages à deux in op.12 no.2’s opening movement and sextuplets in op.12 no.3’s equivalent seem needlessly garbled; otherwise, articulation is crisp, textures are light and clear, phrases are carefully shaped and the youthful Beethoven’s witty, playful side is generously embraced, particularly in the finales of op.12 nos.1 and 2. The opening Allegro of op.24 elicits elegant exchanges of melody and accompaniment from the duo and their accounts of the cantabile slow movements of op.12 no.3 and op.24 are profoundly moving.

ROBIN STOWELL