Hello all,

I had the pleasure of giving a small recital a few weeks before Christmas with some friends of mine. Unfortunately, the audio quality of the recording is not good enough to share with all of you, but I wanted to share the music regardless.

The first piece on the program was the Sonata for Piano and Violin in A Major by Johannes Brahms. Brahms wrote this work while spending the summer of 1886 in Thun, Switzerland. Nestled between two lakes with the Alps towering on either side, Thun was the ideal location for an inspiring summer of composition. The second sonata is the shortest of the three Brahms wrote for these two instruments, but it is considered the most difficult because of its challenging blend of delicacy and virtuosity. It is light-hearted and radiant throughout, with moments of intensity that resolve into rhapsodic back-and-forth exchanges between the two instruments.

There are three movements. In the first movement, relish the soft touch of the piano line. Brahms, a pianist himself, gives the piano much of the melodic material in the first movement. The second movement darts between fast and slow, energetic and dreamy. Listen for the way the two instruments imitate each other and trade melodic lines back and forth. In the third movement, Brahms gives the violin a deep, rich melody line that ends with triumphant flourish. Listen for that classic Brahmsian “dark chocolate” sound.

Enjoy!

T