Boris Belkin and Michel Dalberto bring an aristocratic quality to Brahms’s three violin sonatas. However, they offer more power than elegance or spontaneity, and despite their evident mastery and mutual understanding the lilting G major Sonata becomes too severe an affair, with a particularly portentous Adagio. In this strong field, one only has to hear Osostowicz and Tomes to realize that Brahms is better served by a more intimate and flexible approach. One acid test here is the first movement of the A major Sonata, with its carefully worded marking of Allegro amabile: in this performance we seem to be addressed from on high virtually from the start, and with an air of command at that, rather than being coaxed along by a friend; the requested tranquillo and grazioso elements of the Andante and finale are also underplayed.
Predictably, perhaps, Belkin and Dalberto are more convincing in the D minor Sonata, with its greater storm and stress. They are not really competitive, though, when other recorded duos, besides the Hyperion team mentioned above, include Dumay and Pires (DG, 3/93), Stern and Bronfman (Sony, 3/94) and Perlman and Ashkenazy (EMI, 2/87). Denon give the present artists a clear though rich sound.'