The concept may be questionable, but the performances carry the day
The Strad Issue: March 2025
Description: The concept may be questionable, but the performances carry the day
Musicians: Patricia Kopatchinskaja (violin) Thomas Kaufmann (cello) Camerata Bern
Works: Music by Panufnik, Schnittke, Schubert, Wyschnegradsky, Ysaÿe and trad. arr. Keren
Catalogue number: ALPHA 1110
Think too hard about the ideas behind what’s essentially a classical concept album from Camerata Bern and violinist–director Patricia Kopatchinskaja – ideas of exile and migration, of related traumas and perhaps also opportunities – and things begin to unravel. Whether the eclectic collection of repertoire really offers any new insights into experiences of migration (or, in the case of the disc’s two folk-inspired tracks, even connects with the theme) is definitely up for discussion.
But as a carefully curated collection of striking, deeply distinctive works, delivered in vivid, lapel-grabbing performances, Exile offers a thoroughly rewarding experience. Kopatchinskaja herself provides a passionate, rhapsodic account of Panufnik’s Concerto for violin and strings, finding hard-edged definition among the soaring lyricism of the first movement, and injecting obsessive intensity into its nervy finale.
Camerata Bern principal cellist Thomas Kaufmann delivers a deeply moving performance of Schnittke’s First Cello Sonata (in an orchestration by Martin Mecker), ramping up the composer’s grotesquerie in the piece’s nerve-jangling central scherzo while conjuring Schnittke’s wildly disparate musical landscapes with calm assurance in a draining final Largo.
Alongside a hushed, ghostly Schubert Minuet and a wonderfully luscious Ysaÿe Exil! to close, most impressive is Russian exile Ivan Wyschnegradsky’s pioneering microtonal Quartet no.2 from 1931, given a thrillingly confident performance (by an unidentified foursome of Bern players led by Kopatchinskaja) that revels in the composer’s ear-tweaking dissonances while clearly projecting the musical arguments they carry.
DAVID KETTLE
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