Contrary to what you would expect from the common opus number 26, Enescu's both cello sonatas were created 37 years apart. The First Cello Sonata, for example, is still a typical youth work (Enescu composed it at the age of barely seventeen), in which his idols clearly resound: Brahms, Saint-Saëns, Massenet and Fauré. It is different with the Second Cello Sonata from 1935. Here we hear the
… characteristic philosophical tone from, for example, the Third Symphony and the opera Oedipe. At the same time, the dark sound eruptions seem to be a harbinger of the impending catastrophe in European history five years later. Even the final part 'Final à la roumaine' cannot remove that shadow. In this, Enescu harks back to his two famous Romanian Rhapsodies, in which a colorful mix of Romanian dances and other folkloric genres are strung together with an almost improvisational élan. Cellist Alexandre Dmitriev and pianist Alexandre Paley deliver thorough live performances. Too bad that the sound editor has not bothered to clean up disturbing, but apparently inevitable audience noises. (JWvR)more