Following Daniel Lozakovich’s acclaimed DG debut (8/18), this Tchaikovsky album brings his artistry into sharper focus. The Concerto was recorded live – presumably from a series of performances, as there is a small but audible edit at 2'30" in the first movement – and presents Lozakovich playing in the heat of the moment. Listen, for instance, to the passage at 6'12" in the same movement, where he seems less concerned with precision than about the shape of the gesture, or at 5'01" in the finale, where he’s willing to smudge a few notes (not that he smudges very many) in his fervour to drive the phrases towards their goal. That said, I never get the sense he uses his technique to dazzle; rather, he always seems to keep lyricism to the fore.

Lozakovich plays the Canzonetta with the utmost tenderness, practically clinging to the melody for dear life. Yet if he’s quite free with rubato, he’s also careful to bind the phrases together so they retain a certain naturalness and nobility. There are a few passages where I feel his ardour makes him forget Tchaikovksy’s instructions. He observes the piano marking at the initial appearance of the Allegro moderato’s second theme, for example – playing it with disarming confidentiality – but not at the melody’s reappearance (at 14'35"), where he sings out at a full forte. I can’t detect any audience noise, although I’m pretty certain the crowd erupted at the work’s end, for the final minutes are absolutely electrifying.

The six shorter pieces were recorded in the studio and present Lozakovich in craftsman mode – not that there’s a hint of coolness or emotional reserve in any of them. In the booklet note, he tells the interviewer how he aimed in the transcription of Lensky’s aria from Eugene Onegin to combine the tonal beauty of Wunderlich with the intensity of Kozlovsky – and he does exactly that. He finds drama, too, in the ‘Méditation’ (originally the slow movement of the Concerto), so it becomes a sister scene to the aria. What impresses me most, perhaps, is that his taste is as exquisite as his open-heartedness and technical finesse. He brings a light touch to salon bonbons like the ‘Mélodie’ and Valse sentimentale, and manages to find warmth even in the sparkling staccato and spiccato passages of the Valse-Scherzo.

Vladimir Spivakov elicits thrillingly articulate playing from the Moscow-based orchestra in the Concerto and provides aptly atmospheric support in the miniatures. I found the shift to piano accompaniment for three numbers slightly jarring at first, although they’re sensitively played by Stanislav Soloviev. Indeed, the entire album is hugely enjoyable and offers ample proof that the violinist, still in his teens, is no mere flash in the pan.