Recording of the Week, Beethoven & Beyond from María Dueñas

I spent much of last week at a conference on the future of the classical recording industry in Vienna, where there was much discussion about whether the world really needs more accounts of core repertoire – particularly from emerging artists whose energies might be more profitably channelled into putting their own stamp on neglected and new works rather than jumping straight into a market that’s already overcrowded by more established (and in some cases downright legendary) names.

It was with a certain degree of circumspection, then, that I returned to audition Granada-born violinist María Dueñas’s debut on Deutsche Grammophon with the Beethoven concerto, recorded live in Vienna with Manfred Honeck and the Wiener Symphoniker. But within a couple of phrases it became obvious that Dueñas is the exception to the rule: at 20, she’s still a student at the city’s University of Music and Performing Arts, yet it sounds for all the world like she’s lived with this work for decades. 

In fact, Dueñas has been working on the piece in earnest for just four years, though she told me on Wednesday that she couldn’t resist ‘playing around’ with it from a very young age – and one of the things which makes this recording special is the way she combines that sense of almost childlike wonder and exploration with absolute technical mastery and a firm, supremely confident grasp on the score’s overall architecture.  

 On the face of it, much about this account is straight down the line, even slightly old-school: Honeck (who's championed the young violinist since she arrived in Vienna six years ago) sets the scene in the long introductory tutti with a sleek, richly upholstered orchestral sound that might sound a little antediluvian to anyone used to the more astringent approach taken on period-instrument recordings, or even to Rattle’s recent, rather earthier account with the London Symphony Orchestra and Veronika Eberle. But it sets the scene beautifully for Dueñas’s first entry, which catches the ear immediately thanks to her piercingly sweet tone and a super-flexible, almost improvisatory approach to phrasing that never crosses the line into self-indulgence.

 Those qualities are borne out throughout the whole work, with elegance and cantabile beauty the order of the day: the long lines of the slow movement sing out with real bel canto sumptuousness (the gorgeous upper register of her Gagliano violin especially striking here), and the closing Rondo is given with light-footed grace, rather than the Bierkeller-ish swagger which some interpretations lean into. And Dueñas’s own intelligently-crafted cadenzas are entirely of a piece with her overall approach to the score: don’t expect the madcap brilliance of Patricia Kopatchinskaja or the extended techniques and harmonic adventurousness of Jörg Widmann for Eberle (both of which enlist orchestral principals in their extemporisations), but just enjoy her thoughtful yet spontaneous-sounding reflections on the thematic material on their own terms. 

It’s cadenzas which provide the impetus for the rest of the programme, which consists of shorter pieces by some of the composers who penned their own contributions to the Beethoven concerto – Kreisler (whose cadenza has become the default option for many violinists) of course features, but so do Spohr, Saint-Saëns, Ysaÿe and Wieniawski. Two rarities here stand out: the Adagio from Spohr’s lovely, inexplicably overlooked Concertante for Violin and Harp (which sounds like one of the Beethoven Romances shot through with foreshadowings of the Intermezzo from Mascagni’s Cavalleria rusticana), and Ysaÿe’s melancholy little Berceuse, which surely deserves to be as well-known as Fauré’s. Saint-Saëns’s Havanaise is given with a subtle sensuality and swing which testifies to Dueñas’s Spanish roots, whilst Kreisler’s Liebesleid is all the more beguiling for not being over-sentimentalised.

 All five composers’ cadenzas to the first movement of the Beethoven are included on a bonus disc, which makes for a more satisfying continuous listen then you might imagine – it’s akin to hearing a coherent but contrasted set of variations rather than a mere academic appendix, and Dueñas characterises their different moods astutely. Make no mistake, she’s a major talent indeed: and if you’re keen to hear her in a concerto that’s a little more off the beaten track, I have reason to believe that the chance will come fairly soon…