This release by cellist
Mikayel Hakhnazaryan
and pianist
Lia Hakhnazaryan
comes with a note about leaving one's homeland and thus discovering new music and new inner paths. It seems fairly innocuous, yet the players make something powerful and distinctive out of it. The nostalgia part is unusually strong, and some of it is unique to this album; the players include two pieces by the single-named Armenian composer-ethnomusicologist
Komitas
(
Soghomon Soghomonian
) that are arranged for the utterly haunting combination of cello and the Armenian double-reed duduk. Try to come up with the most evocative possible image of remembering sounds and places of home, and these two lovely pieces will match it. There are also several other Armenian pieces, including the rarely heard
Dream for cello and piano
of
Aram Khachaturian
, whose neglect in the face of the general shortage of solo cello material is inexplicable. As
Hakhnazaryan
's note suggests, there are also several Western pieces, including
Ernest Bloch
's
From Jewish Life
, which fits the general mood and works by
Schumann
(the
Fantasiestuecke, Op. 73
, transcribed for cello) and
Debussy
, which breaks it somewhat but receive lively interpretations. The thorny
Cello Sonata
is the most distant from the album's core, but the performance is strong enough to stand on its own. There is even a piece for cello and electronics by
Carl Vine
at the end, emphasizing the poles of nostalgia and new discovery. This is wholly unlike other cello recitals, and it will introduce general listeners to some wonderful music. ~ James Manheim