Chopin's complete works for cello and piano, as from Lodeon and Duchable, certainly add up to an eminently desirable Erato disc. But so, I think, do the two endearing sonatas coupled here—neither of them over-generously represented in the catalogue. I'd never encountered the Swiss cellist, Claude Starck, a pupil of Bazelaire and Fournier, as a soloist before, nor his Spanish partner, Ricardo Requejo, whose teachers included Perlemuter. But I enjoyed them enough here to hope that their return to the recording studio won't be too long delayed. Their playing is so vibrant. Starck's lovely tone, ethereal in pianissimo, is capable of exceptional intensity in climaxes, while his pliable phrasing I can only describe as of the kind that speaks. Requejo is a true partner, never an ashamed accompanist. Both sonatas have dangerously full piano parts, but not at all in the Grieg and only once or twice in the Chopin are you made aware of that fact. There's just a trace of plumminess in the keyboard reproduction. But the recording has great living presence. The cello comes over supremely well. Starck could be right at your side.
No need, then, to hesitate if it's a CD version of the two works that you want. On LP there's highly musicianly competition from Cohen and Vignoles (CRD) in the Grieg. But I'd still choose the newcomers for their riper characterization, and still more for Starck's greater tonal radiance. This performance should win the work many new friends. In the Chopin there's equally strong competition from Lodeon and Duchable who, incidentally stick to the familiar text in the first movement's second subject instead of the questionable variant introduced in the eight bars before letter C by Starck and Requejo. For the Largo the Frenchmen prefer a considerably slower tempo than the newcomers, whose approach I would describe as a little more romantically rhapsodic. Both versions in their different ways are distinguished. But my final vote goes to the newcomers for making the music just that little much more their own—as, for instances, in their more intimate handling of the finale's second subject.'