Sor packed a great deal into his 61 years of life: musical studies at Montserrat, army service, politically enforced exile, and a career in Paris, London, Moscow, Germany and Poland as a performer, teacher (of the guitar and singing) and composer of music (including opera and ballet). Though once described as ''the Beethoven of the guitar'' Sor was closer in style to Haydn and Mozart, a writer of meticulously crafted, gracious and lyrical music in the established 'classical' forms. His association with the salon-musical scene is evident in his numerous sets of theme and variations, of which his Op. 9 is the most famous and, preceded by slow introductions, these often lurked under the title of ''Fantaisie''—as with Op. 40 (variations on Ye banks and braes), Op. 30 andOp. 7 (the variations follow the here detached Largo non tanto).
The heart of this programme is however the Fantaisie elegiaque, not a set of variations but a two-part funeral ode to one Charlotte Beslay, whose forename is written over the music near the end— ''Charlotte, adieu!''. Its poignancy is unmatched in the nineteenth-century repertory of the guitar; Sollscher, an aristocrat of the instrument, wrings every drop of dignified grief from it. Elsewhere, with pristine technique and beautifully clear sound, he shows his (and Sor's) ability to sparkle. There is no finer record of Sor's music on the present-day guitar, nor is there one that is more likely to appeal to non-guitarist music-lovers—who will not be disappointed, either, by the quality of the recording itself.'