This is a very different reading of the Shostakovich from that of Ma and Ax on CBS, but it too carries strong conviction, and listeners who find Ma a little too expansive may prefer it. There's no lack of intensity here, but the Harrell/Ashkenazy approach sounds much more classical in comparison, especially in the fine opening sonata-allegro exactly the kind of movement which (as Ivor Humphreys observed in his interview with Julian Lloyd Webber last October, page 610) Shostakovich later claimed he was unable to write. Like Webber and McCabe (Philips), Harrell and Ashkenazy bring out the shape of this movement beautifully, with the coda's Largo winding-down sounding not a bar too long, and the exposition repeat seeming more appropriate than in the richly romantic Ma version.
It is Ma, however, not Webber, nor the sensitive but somewhat reserved Baillie (Unicorn-Kanchana), who offers the strongest competition. His sense of shape may be marginally weaker in the Allegro non troppo, but it's a very compelling performance, and m the three later movements he finds more variety and still greater depths of feeling than Harrell and Ashkenazy. The bizarre and unsettling contrasts of the finale are given just the right emphasis: more sharply contrasted than in the Harrell/Ashkenazy version, but way short of the crude buffoonery of Yuli Turovsky and Luba Edlina on Chandos. Harrell and Ashkenazy's gritty, forceful Scherzo is impressive, and their Largo digs deeply, but in the recapitulation no current version rivals Ma and Ax for pathos—Ashkenazy's pointing sounds just a little careful in comparison. I also prefer the sound of the Ma version: the metallic clarity of the Decca recording suits Harrell's cutting A string quavers at the start of the Scherzo, but in one or two other places the gain in edge is unwelcome. Cello and piano are well balanced, but both are a little lacking in presence.
In the Prokofiev, Harrell and Ashkenazy are clear winners. Their opening Andante grave combines gravity and flowing eloquence in a way neither Alexander Baillie nor Dimitri Ferschtman (Etcetera/Harmonia Mundi) quite match, and while Baillie's brisker approach to the Sonata's cyclical apotheosis strips this passage of pomposity, it is Harrell and Ashkenazy who communicate most strongly the sense of achievement I feel Prokofiev wanted.
Shostakovich's Moderato is a trifle; if it ever was intended (as has been suggested) for inclusion in the Sonata, the composer obviously took the right course in rejecting it. The performance is appealing, but the interest is, I suspect, limited to Shostakovich connoisseurs.'