An inspiring melting-pot of viola and cello duos
The Strad Issue: April 2026
Description: An inspiring melting-pot of viola and cello duos
Musicians: Caitlin Boyle (viola) Dobrochna Zubek (cello)
Works: Music by Clarke, Glière, Lutosławski, Shaw, Shostakovich and Zubek
Redshift Records redshiftmusicsociety@bandcamp.com
Viola and cello duo albums are thin on the ground, and there’s some great repertoire in this 20th and 21st century-focused programme. It comes from two of Canada’s most respected collaborators, violist Caitlin Boyle and cellist Dobrochna Zubek.
Violist–composer Rebecca Clarke’s Two Pieces for viola and cello, written to perform with English cellist May Mukle, deserves more airings than it currently gets. Boyle and Zubek are persuasive in their richly toned blending of the work’s plentiful double-stopping and folky melodies, all captured with immediacy in the Humbercrest United Church’s bright, generous acoustic.
Lutosławski’s folky Bucolics shines here in the players’ own transcription; its Andantino features some plangent cello portamentos.
Less harmonically spicy but similarly folkily melodic are the three numbers from Glière’s Eight Pieces op.39. The cellist’s father Andrzej Zubek is also represented, The Break of Dawn receiving its recording premiere and proving one of the highlights of the album.
This is such a stylistically coherent programme that some may hanker after more contrast if listening end to end. That said, there’s no doubt that this is an inspirational repertoire compendium for string enthusiasts.
CHARLOTTE GARDNER
No comments yet