CD ECM Records Kim Kashkashian, Lera Auerbach - Shostakovich, Auerbach: Arcanum

2016

Kim Kashkashian - viola
Lera Auerbach - pian

Dimitri Shostakovich: 24 Preludes Op. 34
Lera Auerbach: Arcanum - Sonata For Viola And Piano

Armenian-American violist Kim Kashkashian, one of the major musical voices of ECM New Series, introduces a new duo with Russian composer-pianist Lera Auerbach. Their first recording together features Auerbach’s viola and piano version of Dmitri Shostakovich’s often playful 24 Preludes op. 34, and Auerbach’s own, darker, sonata for viola and piano, Arcanum. Lera Auerbach says, “Arcanum means ‘mysterious knowledge’, and I was fascinated by the inner voice within each of us, some may call it perhaps intuition, some maybe guided meditation, but there is some knowledge that we have, which we may not necessarily verbalize or rationalize, but that allows us to see the truth, to be guided, to seek answers.” Auerbach wrote her sonata for Kashkashian: “There is a quality of life-or-death-intensity to her performing, which is rare and wonderful.”


* * *

Auerbach’s duo version of Shostakovich’s Op. 34 Piano Preludes — a cycle of 24 in all the major and minor keys, on the models of Bach and Chopin — is a wizardly reimagining of its source, and the performance here by her and violist Kim Kashkashian seems to channel the earlier composer’s distinctive sound world. […] As performers, Kashkashian and Auerbach make a superb team, playing with urgency and finely tuned balance.
Joshua Kosman, San Francisco Chronicle