Grieg & Medtner: Sonatas No. 3 for Violin & Piano Svetlin Roussev & Frédéric d' Oria-Nicolas

• Edvard Grieg (1843-1907): Sonata n°3 Op. 45
• 1I. Allegro molto ed appassionato08:32
• 2II. Allegretto espressivo alla romanza06:19
• 3III. Allegro animato07:24
• Nikolai Medtner (1880-1951): Sonate n°3 Op. 57 'Epica'
• 4I. Introduzione: Andante meditamente - Allegro15:07
• 5II. Scherzo: Allegro molto vivace e laggiero07:01
• 6III. Andante con moto08:56
• 7IV. Finale: Allegro molto11:49
• Total Runtime01:05:08

Info for Grieg & Medtner: Sonatas No. 3 for Violin & Piano

This fascinating recording brings two contrasting composers together, linked by their 3rd violin and piano sonatas. Grieg’s third and final violin sonata was finished in January 1887, dedicated to the German painter Franz Lenbach. Medtner’s 3rd sonata was also his last one and this was dedicated to his brother Emil, completed in 1938 and premiered the following year at the Aeolian Hall, London by the violinist Arthur Catterall and Medtner himself at the piano.

„In their disc Roussev and D’Oria-Nicolas offer an engaging but not wholly successful, occasionally ‘stagey’ performance of Grieg’s C minor sonata, though they’re incapable of dullness. I wish they’d added a more compelling sonata to their Medtner; why not the first or second of his sonatas or something by Catoire?

As for the two sonatas under review the classic recording of No.3 is by Oistrakh and Goldenweiser, and the composer’s recording with Hansen of No.1 is required listening for the historically minded. Laurence Kayaleh and Paul Stewart offer the sonatas for Naxos, but I’ve not heard them. Of other more recent players the duos of Parikian and Milne, and Mordkovich and Tozer offer all the sonatas, and I strongly prefer the greater dash of the former. Alexander Labko and Evgeny Svetlanov’s sonata cycle is marooned in an all-Svetlanov Medtner box on SVET but they offer strong, resilient readings. Unfortunately, for all their precision and lyricism, I can’t say that Hanslip and Tchetuev offer anything like such authoritative and characterful performances.“ (Jonathan Woolf, MusicWeb International)

Svetlin Roussev, violin
Frédéric d’Oria-Nicolas, piano

Svetlin Roussev
The charismatic violin virtuoso, Svetlin Roussev, began his musical education at a very young age as a student of his mother, a professor at the music school in his home town of Ruse, Bulgaria. He was accepted in 1991 to the “Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris” in the classes of Gérard Poulet, Devy Erlih and Jean-Jacques Kantorow. In 1994 he was unanimously awarded a First Prize, summa cum laude, for violin and a First Prize for chamber music and subsequently entered the postgraduate program.

Svetlin Roussev has won numerous prizes at many international competitions (Indianapolis, Long-Thibaud, Melbourne…) He was voted “Revelation of the year 2000” by the ADAMI at the French industry music festival “Midem” of Cannes and was selected for sponsorship by the Natexis-Banques Populaires Corporate Foundation. May 2001, saw him covered with praises as he was awarded First Prize, Special Audience Prize and Special Prize for the best interpretation of a Bach concerto at the 1st “Sendaï International Competition”, in Japan.

With remarkable virtuosity and intensity, Svetlin Roussev performs a broad ranging repertoire from the Baroque to the contemporary. He is also reknowned for his renditions of Slavic compositions and is one of the foremost propagators of Bulgarian music. Acclaimed in 2006 Bulgarian “Musician of the Year”, Bulgaria honored him, yet again, in 2007 with the “Cristal Lyra” distinction awarded by the Ministry of Culture.

Svetlin Roussev is a regularly invited guest soloist with various orchestras such as the Orchestre National de France, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra, Sendai Philharmonic, Indianapolis Symphony orchestra, Bucarest National George Enescu Orchestra, Roumanian National Radio Orchestra, Bulgarian National Radio, Ankara Presidential Orchestra, Johannesburg Philharmonic, and Symphony Orchestras in the United-States, Latin America, Asia and Europe and has performed under the baton of such conductors as Myung-Whun Chung, Leon Fleisher, Yehudi Menuhin, Yuzo Toyama, Marek Janowski, Raymond Leppard, John Axelrod, François-Xavier Roth, Jean-Jacques Kantorow, Denis Russel-Davies, Lionel Bringuier, Leo Hussain…

Svetlin Roussev has played in many of the world’s concert halls: the Bolchoï Theater, Suntory Hall, Sumida Triphony Center Hall, Seoul Arts Center, Salle Pleyel, UNESCO, Théâtre des Champs Elysées, Théâtre du Châtelet, Cité de la Musique, Théâtre de la Ville, Arsenal de Metz, Halle aux Grains de Toulouse, Bulgaria National Concert Hall, Budapest Bela Bartok National Concert Hall, Frankfurt Alte Oper, Palais des Beaux Arts de Bruxelles…

Svetlin, shares his love for music with an ever widening public through his chamber music performances with partners such as Myung-Whun Chung, Jean-Marc Luisada, Nicolaj Znaider, Philippe Cassard, Jean-Philippe Collard, Eric Le Sage, Ralph Gothoni, Peter Frankl, Antoine Tamestit, Vladimir Mendelssohn, Gary Hoffman, Arto Noras, Sung Won Yang, Young Hoon Song, Xavier Philips, François Leleux, Paul Meyer, Philippe Bernold and he is a founding member of the “Roussev-Salque-Rozanova Trio”.

Following on the heels of his successful CD recording of pieces by Pancho Vladiguerov with the pianist Elena Rozanova, Svetlin has brought out his recording of Karl Amadeus Hartmann’s “Concerto Funèbre”, with the Orchestre d’Auvergne, conducted by Arie Van Beek and recordings for French labels Integral and Fondamenta, dedicated to the Franco-Belgian school of violin with pianist Elena Rozanova and pieces by Grieg and Medtner with pianist Frédéric D’Oria-Nicolas.

He is the concertmaster of the “Radio France Philharmonic Orchestra” and, since 2007, Concertmaster of the “Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra”. Svetlin Roussev is violin professor at his alma mater, the “Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris”. He plays the Stradivarius 1710 Camposelice violin kindly loaned by the Nippon Music Foundation.

Frédéric d’Oria-Nicolas
"A pianist of wide culture, with a keen intelligence, sensitivity, open-mindedness and imagination in keeping with his extraordinary virtuosity" Vladimir Tropp, Frédéric D’Oria-Nicolas is "an exceptional, subtle, powerful and elegant pianist" Classiquenews, "a master of symphonic storms and images” Midi-libre. The intelligence of his programmes, his generous personality and the particularly warm contact which he maintains with his audience do make him an exceptional artist: "Listening to Frédéric D’Oria-Nicolas playing Scriabin has been, for me, the most intense pianistic shock since Horowitz." Aldo Naouri.

After six years in Moscow, Frédéric D’Oria-Nicolas graduated from the Moscow State Gnesin Academy of Music from the class of Professor Tatiana Zelikman. He has also received the advice of distinguished musicians such as Dmitri Bashkirov, Lev Naumov and Vladimir Tropp. His career has been punctuated with many awards: the Classical Revelation Prize of the Year by the ADAMI, the First prize at the Saint-Petersburg Mravinsky Competition, the competition of the Bleustein-Blanchet Vocation Fund. He has also been rewarded by the Charles Oulmont Foundation and the Mécénat Musical Société Générale. In 2009 Frédéric D’Oria-Nicolas was elected "Artist of the Year 2009" by Resmusica (member of MIDEM).

His record dedicated to Schubert for the Fondamenta label was unanimously greeted by critics. “From the very beginning of the Sonata in B flat D960 by Schubert, we are struck by a very beautiful sound which leads us into that outstanding piece as in a dream. Indeed, such control of the sound isn’t given to everyone and contributes to the bewitchment we feel” Pianiste Magazine "Frédéric D'Oria-Nicolas has captured the essence of the twenty-third sonata outstandingly. In addition to the exceptional sonority, the style is natural, steady, assured and elegant" Concertonet "Frédéric D'Oria-Nicolas’s vision is both spectacular and humble, never forced upon us but always guided, so that it leaves us in suspense, plunged into a musing close to ecstasy” Resmusica

In 2010 Frédéric D’Oria-Nicolas along with the violinist Svetlin Roussev recorded a CD, dedicated to the 3rd sonatas by Grieg and by Medtner for the Fondamenta label. That recording was acclaimed by the major critics in all Europe and was granted most major prizes, such as the « M » of Mezzo Channel, Choice of France Musique, Clé Resmusica, 4 Stars Classica, 5 Diapasons. “Remarkable interpretation, all in sensitivity full of images and emotions is worthy to the one recorded in 1928 by Kreisler and Rachmaninov” L’Education Musicale "A fascinating recording" Presto Classical "That recording with its attractive presentation and its impeccable sound recording exudes the love for music: a harmonious work of architecture and passion" Concertonet “Roussev and D’Oria-Nicolas managed perfectly to bring to mind orchestral sonorities imagined by Medtner with wonderful tonal vibrancy and arresting colouring." Classic FM Magazine

Strong of his almost 320-work-repertoire, Frédéric D’Oria-Nicolas has performed in more than 20 countries – in venues such as the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory, the Hermitage of Saint-Petersburg, the Tbilisi Conservatory (Georgia), the Tretyakov Gallery, the Scriabin Museum, the Gaveau Concert Hall, The Arsenal Concert Hall of Metz, the Oratorium du Louvre, the Saint-Petersburg White Nights Festival, the Hamamatsu Act City (Japan), the Shanghai Oriental Center (China), the Kuhmo Festival (Finland), the Estate Musicale di Portogruaro (Italy), the Amsterdam Grachten Festival (Netherlands), the Bratislava International Festival (Slovakia), the Festival de Saint-Denis, the Festival de Prades, the Festival de Colmar… He is regularly invited at various French and foreign radios and television channels such as France 2, France 3, Kultura (Russia), France-Musique, France-Culture, Radio-Classique… In 2009, the noteworthy Two Piano recital, which Frédéric D’Oria-Nicolas gave with Alexander Kobrin at Gaveau Concert Hall in Paris, has been broadcasted several times by MEZZO Channel, in 39 countries.

As a popular chamber music partner, Frédéric D’Oria-Nicolas plays with Alexander Kobrin, Svetlin Roussev, Lise Berthaud, Xavier Phillips, Nicolas Dautricourt, François Salque, Amaury Coeytaux, Kristina Blaumane, Yan Levionnois, Romain Leleu, Raphaël Perraud and Laurent Naouri. This has led him to take on the artistic direction of Fondamenta Productions in July 2008.

During the seasons 2011-2013, Frédéric D’Oria-Nicolas will perform in France, Switzerland, Luxemburg, South Korea, China, Taiwan, Russia, the United Arab Emirates and the United States of America.

Booklet for Grieg & Medtner: Sonatas No. 3 for Violin & Piano