Patricia Kopatchinskaja had some trepidation when approaching Janáček’s Violin Sonata. ‘I was afraid I’d explode, that’s how concentrated and wounded this music is. It tears me apart every time we play it.’ Those ‘concentrated’ and ‘wounded’ characteristics she describes are quite palpable in this new recording. Listening with the score in hand, I had a few reservations about some liberties taken – ignoring the composer’s indication to return to the opening tempo at 0'26" in the first movement, for instance – but the duo uncover so much marvellous detail and evoke such powerful emotion that by the work’s end I found myself wholly persuaded. Note, say, the brittle way Kopatchinskaja plays the sonata’s opening figure, so the notes become jagged shards (an effect I’ll admit I found off-putting at first), which seems a premonition of the jittery, almost percussive violin-writing at the opening of the finale. This wouldn’t be the only recording of Janáček’s Violin Sonata I’d want in my library, but it’s quite special and one I know I’ll want to return to.

The interpretations of Brahms’s Third and Bartók’s First sonatas are similarly searching and intense while remaining more consistently faithful to the texts. I love the hushed confidentiality they bring to the Adagio of the Brahms – listen to how fragile and tender they render the passage at 1'32", for example. And in the other three movements, the passion conveyed goes hand in hand with rhythmic tautness and an appreciation for the music’s wealth of textural contrast.

As for the Bartók, while I can’t say Kopatchinskaja and Say’s performance is as white-hot as Kremer and Argerich’s live account from Berlin (EMI, 6/09), it’s still a wild, thrilling ride. Every phrase here is sharply characterised – as well as powerfully gestural – and their playing is as volatile as the music itself. In the slow movement, Say’s sensitivity to colour and the ‘weight’ of the chords and harmonies underscores Debussy’s influence. And throughout the sonata, Kopatchinskaja’s ability to adjust her tone from the finest-gauge wire to a thick, rough-hewn rope is astonishing. Yet for all their seriousness and focus, they find moments of humour, too, as in the drunken passage in the finale at 4'43".

You can be sure this handsomely recorded recital will be on my list of 2023’s best.