Hard on the heels of Viktoria Mullova’s re-recording of the Bach Partitas, and Angela Hewitt’s re-recording of the Well-Tempered Clavier, Imogen Cooper is re-recording late Schubert. I love her earlier recordings on Ottavo; but this first disk in the projected new series is even better.
David Cairns in the Sunday Times gets it right: “The intervening years have seen a deepening understanding of this wonderful repertoire. The range of colour, the subtle details, the singing line, the freedom of tempo within the driving momentum, the haunting and haunted beauty, are greater than ever.” Revelatory in fact. Getting off the marking treadmill and listening to this has made a wonderful pause.
Oh, and another musical delight. I just can’t think what prompted me idly to visit the Wigmore Hall website again this afternoon (five minutes, in fact, after getting the cheering e-mail from CUP to say they were putting things right), but I was amazed to find that a little block of the very best seats for Viktoria Mullova’s Bach recital in September had become available. So I was able to snap up a couple after all! I am thrilled to bits.
The temperament of your writing is like classical music itself.
NS