Washington Classical Review

Gil Shaham performed a recital at Wolf Trap Tuesday night. Photo: Chris Lee

Three hundred years ago, a German immigrant built a barn for his farm in rural New York. This historic building, dismantled, refurbished and transported to northern Virginia in 1980, became half of the venue now known as the Barns at Wolf Trap. Violinist Gil Shaham and pianist Akira Eguchi marked the anniversary with a 75-minute recital Tuesday night, followed by a fund-raising dinner for Wolf Trap’s arts and education programs.

The violin played by Shaham, the “Countess Polignac” made by Antonio Stradivari in 1699, is even older than the building where it was heard. The evening opened with music from the 18th century as well, beginning with Jean-Marie Leclair’s Violin Sonata in D Major, Op. 9, no. 3. Leclair, the founder of the French school of violin playing, posed many challenges in the piece, both musical and technical.

Shaham excelled in the latter, if not always the former, in this work. Double-stops were clean and in tune, and the gigue-like second movement danced vividly. The gorgeous Sarabande, however, never quite lifted off the page, eclipsed by the rapid fiddle-like figuration of the fourth movement (“Tambourin”), written in imitation of folk instruments.

The decision to have Eguchi accompany the program’s baroque works on harpsichord, while admirable historically, backfired for other reasons. Eguchi’s facility at the instrument, where there is no dynamic control in the touch, felt limited and occasionally awkward. A problem with the choice of registration on the harpsichord required a restart of the first movement as well.

Antonio Vivaldi published The Four Seasons in 1725, an event commemorated last month at the Library of Congress, in what was also the same year that the German Barn came into existence. Shaham played only the “Winter” concerto, with Eguchi on a harpsichord arrangement of the orchestral parts. Shaham brought out the sonic effects of the first movement, giving a dissonant edge to the shivering motif that opened the concerto.

While the second movement, taken at a hasty pace, again fell short on reflective beauty, Shaham displayed polished technical achievement in the outer movements. The stunning runs cut like icy winds in the first movement, and quicksilver shifts of tempo and articulation gave an unpredictable frisson of excitement to the third.

Eguchi seemed much more comfortable seated at the venue’s Steinway, producing elegant, subtly shaded accompaniment in Beethoven’s Violin Sonata No. 4. He and Shaham played the first movement at an admirably fleet tempo, tempered by cool technical control. The second movement meandered at a pleasing tempo, with a slightly comic touch, shifting between a jaunty character and mused restraint.

In the third movement, almost as fast as the first, the finger facility of both players impressed. This impassioned finale came to a moment of velvety softness, delicately poised, before the musicians moved ahead for a final flourish.

If the Beethoven sonata proved the most successful piece on the program overall, the most ravishing musical moments came in the slow movement of Fauré’s Violin Sonata in A Major, with Shaham’s vibrant tone rising over the somber, minor-shaded background created initially by Eguchi. The duo wove a spell of serene sound, especially in the softest sections of this movement.

In other parts of this sonata, as in the first movement, Shaham’s desire for a large, more intense tone sometimes resulted in harshness, with occasional lapses of intonation. The third movement, a breathlessly paced Scherzo, offered a wild escapade of buzzing runs in both violin and piano. The Finale abounded in a sense of rhapsodic tumult, albeit with some more mild violin intonation issues at the louder moments.

A charming encore, Banjo and Fiddle by American violinist and composer William Kroll, toyed with the folk idioms of the two instruments in its title. Played with a joyous wink by both performers, the piece suited the rustic milieu whose anniversary Wolf Trap celebrated in style, its old German Barn.

The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center performs Boccherini’s String Quintet in G minor, Beethoven’s String Trio in G major, Barrière’s Sonata for Two Cellos, and D’Ambrosio’s Suite for Strings 7:30 p.m. January 30, 2026. wolftrap.org