Violinist
Vilde Frang
has been on a career upswing, but she enters a highly crowded field when it comes to
Beethoven
's
Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 61
. Nevertheless, this recording merits strong consideration for listeners' time and money. First is the unusual pairing on the program;
Stravinsky
Violin Concerto in D major
of 1931 is not a commonly played work, and it makes an interesting foil for the
. Where
did so much to define the role of the soloist in the 19th century concerto,
largely folds the soloist back into the ensemble, treating her or him separately only for specific effect. It is an intriguing neoclassic work that is quite accessible and ought to be featured on orchestral programs more often. Better still is the obvious rapport between
Frang
and conductor
Pekka Kuusisto
.
Kuusisto
is a violinist himself, temporarily sidelined by a hand injury, and he molds the
Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen
into a flexible instrument that wraps itself around a very lively performance from
. In the first movement of the
, the violinist uses an unusual cadenza adapted from
's own version of the
concerto for piano and orchestra
, and in the second movement, she inserts an unusually long cadenza at the end, after the big transitional chords in the orchestra. These unexpected events are confidently handled by
and the orchestra. Overall, this is an entirely fresh release from a very exciting young violinist, and its appearance on classical best-seller lists in the autumn of 2022 is not surprising in the least. ~ James Manheim