Szymanowski:
Sonata for Violin and Piano in D Minor, Op. 9

Hindemith:
Sonata for Violin and Piano in E Flat Major, Op. 11 Nr. 1

Respighi:
Sonata for Violin and Piano, P. 110

„Ever since Frédéric Chopin, Poland had not brought forth another composer of international stature. The late 1800‘s marked an all-time low in Polish national music history – a scene frozen in time, as if all contact was broken off with innovations in Western Europe. Thus, when the young Karol Szymanowski made his entrance with a new, unruly musical vocabulary, he met with little sympathy. Instead of compromising with the reactionary zeitgeist in his home country, Szymanowski decided to go abroad to enlarge his musical horizon. Berlin was then the capital of European classical music, and Szymanowski, with his enthusiasm for Wagner and Richard Strauss, could not resist its attraction. In Leipzig he was introduced to the counterpoint of Max Reger. He found further inspiration in the Second Viennese School, and in the Impressionist timbres of Debussy and Ravel. Musical cultures of the Mediterranean tantalized Szymanowski, even the exotic sonorities of the Near East, and Polish folklore was naturally a further source of inspiration. “He wanted to be the Polish Stravinsky”, a friend recalled. ………

…..Just like Karol Szymanowski, Paul Hindemith was best acquainted with the violin’s full potential. Hindemith played the instrument so well that at the young age of nineteen he was already appointed concertmaster at Frankfurt Opera. Then he switched to viola and went on to pursue a successful career between the wars as a viola soloist and as a member of the Amar Quartet. In this period, Hindemith was still trying to find his voice as a composer and wrote a great number of highly original works for both instruments…….

…….. Respighi had finished studying violin at the age of twenty in his home town of Bologna: he was thus well-acquainted with the violin, and went on composing regularly for the instrument throughout his life. Some of the most significant works in this vein were Respighi’s Concerto gregoriano for violin and orchestra, as well as the Violin Sonata in B minor (1917). This large-scale, traditionally oriented work in three movements exudes a lyrical, rhapsodic mood.