Chamber Music Society serves up a soufflé of sonatas at Wolf Trap
Violinist Paul Huang was among the musicians who performed in the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center concert Friday night at Wolf Trap. Photo: Marco Borggreve
When the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center comes to town, they often bring the welcome rarity of a mixed program, with many instruments and combinations thereof.
For their Friday night performance at the Barns at Wolf Trap, the Society presented four sonatas with piano: two for violin, one for cello, and one for flute. All had their memorable moments, but the standout was violinist Paul Huang and pianist Evren Ozel’s performance of Gabriel Fauré’s Violin Sonata No. 1 after intermission.
The Fauré sonata boasts so much poignant melody that many performances get bogged down in sentimental swooning. Huang and Ozel took slightly faster tempos than usual, but their assured playing meant nothing felt rushed, while the structure of the sonata came more to the fore.
The first movement, in particular, had more of a through-line than usual, as the duo built gently to arresting climaxes and ruminated on its chromatic harmonies. Huang got a wide variety of colors from his 1742 Guarneri del Desù instrument: a hushed caress of a melody in the second movement, a joyous scamper in the third, with Ozel matching his partner’s tone and intensity. The finale, a generous helping of fetching tunes, found Huang and Ozel at their most charming.
Huang also was heard in the concert opener, Mozart’s Sonata in E-flat Major, K. 302, with pianist Orion Weiss. With three hefty works elsewhere on the program, the Mozart worked as a light appetizer. Occasionally, one could hear Huang and Weiss trying to scale down their sound to fit into Mozart’s musical idiom, like a fast car idling along in first gear. Still, Weiss played crisply and elegantly, and Huang in the accompaniment role (per Mozart’s conception) gave generous support. The finale of this two-movement sonata, a rondo that walked at an Andante grazioso tempo, balanced wit and affection, with Huang and Weiss embracing both in the quiet close.
After the Mozart, cellist Jonathan Swensen joined Weiss for Edvard Grieg’s Cello Sonata, a big slice of Romantic beef that should satisfy anyone who likes the composer’s Piano Concerto. Swensen used his huge, heroic tone to power Grieg’s tumultuous first movement, and Weiss scaled up his sound to match. In the slow movement, the cellist showed that he can also command attention with hushed melodic lines, navigating tricky turns hand-in-glove with Weiss. The finale starts at a rousing gallop but felt overlong on Friday; here, a bit more variety of color from Swensen in the louder passages would have helped.
Sergei Prokofiev’s Flute Sonata closed the program, with Adam Walker joining pianist Ozel. This work is more often heard in Prokofiev’s transcription for violin, but the cooler, lighter tone of the flute works better for this music, which (as in so much of Prokofiev) swings between gorgeous melodies and half-sarcastic, angular passages.
Walker and Ozel didn’t see eye-to-eye on tempo at the start, with Walker taking extra breaths before the first movement’s big melody that Ozel didn’t anticipate, but they figured it out in time for the recapitulation of said melody. Walker made his tone sharp and jocular in the second-movement Scherzo, with Ozel providing percussive support.
The Andante third movement’s melody curled and uncurled in a shimmering thread from Walker’s flute, with Ozen equally eloquent in support. The jocular finale got a strong bounce from the duo, ending in a frantic scamper that just stayed in control. It was a treat to hear the original version of this sonata, and to have so many other instrumental colors on the program to enjoy.
The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center returns to the Barns at Wolf Trap to perform Bach, Haydn, Schubert, Strauss, and Tchaikovsky April 25 at 7:30 p.m. wolftrap.org
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