A gold star to Yuri Bashmet for coming clean about the viola's problems: on page 26 he admits to Edward Seckerson ''that intonation and articulation need work, that its husky timbre is probably too soft-grained for its own good'' (ES's paraphrase). Most of this disc is proof of how a first-rate player can not only overcome these difficulties, but even make you accept them as virtues. The huskiness, the relative lack of speaking clarity (as compared with the violin or the cello) is ideally suited to the withdrawn, noctural sound-world of Lachrymae, though Bashmet can boost the voltage impressively when the music requires it. His veiled, almost viol-like tone as Britten's variations at last uncover their theme (Dowland's If my complaints could passions move) is just right—though I'm not sure the manner doesn't get a bit too withdrawn towards the end.
His reading of Trauermusik is less convincing—compact as it is, this is one of Hindemith's most eloquent pieces, and what Bashmet seems to be fighting against is the realization that the seemingly matter-of-fact manner is part of its expressive strength. Unlike Monologue, where Schnittke piles agony on agony with (to these ears) everdecreasing effect, Trauermusik persuades by its very avoidance of histrionics. Bashmet works with all the determination of a Californian therapist to get Hindemith to unload his feelings—but predictably the composer only retreats further into his shell.
The piece where the hard work is most obvious though is the Reger, which however thorough the arrangement doesn't always manage to sound like idiomatic viola music. Quite apart from his efforts to project and articulate, there are places where Bashmet seems to be trying hard simply to get the music off the ground. No, the only work in which I feel that Bashmet's expressive emphasis squares at every stage with the notes is Schnittke's Monologue, and tour de force as it is—from both performers and composer—this 20 minute display of virtuoso keening leaves me less convinced each time I hear it. All the same, the playing is tremendous, and the recording serves it well enough on the whole (though perhaps a different perspective in the Reger would have helped). One comes away from this disc with no doubts about Bashmet's calibre as a musician but I can't help wondering if he isn't simply too extrovert, too volcanic a personality to be entirely comfortable in the central works of his chosen repertoire.
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