Robert deMaine – Beethoven: Complete Music for Cello & Piano (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Robert deMaine – Beethoven: Complete Music for Cello & Piano (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 02:19:51 minutes | 2,47 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Leaf Music

Robert DeMaine (born December 6, 1969 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma) is an American virtuoso cellist, best known as Principal Cello of the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

Pianist Peter Takács is best known as an educator, active for many years on the faculty of the Oberlin Conservatory in Ohio. He has recorded sparingly, but connoisseurs know to keep an eye peeled for his releases, some of them with cellist Robert deMaine. This set of Beethoven’s complete music for cello and piano on the small Leaf Records label, including not only the five sonatas but also three rarely recorded variation sets, makes a fine capstone to the careers of both players. There is nothing groundbreaking about their renditions of these pieces, but they are exceptionally penetrating, catching the exploratory quality of the music. Beethoven more or less invented the cello sonata with two equal players (the two early Op. 5 sonatas are not quite there yet, but come closer than anyone else had up to that point), and these works were on the forward edge of the composer’s creativity. This is especially true of the pair of sonatas of Op. 102, in which many details of Beethoven’s vaunted late style were worked out. The coordination between the two performers here is so close that they seem to be exploring the music together, except that, of course, everything is well considered to a remarkable degree. This is chamber music at its absolute best, with its abstract goal of a conversation between players here applied in a profound concrete way. – James Manheim

Tracklist:

1-1. Robert deMaine – I. Adagio sostenuto – Allegro (16:57)
1-2. Robert deMaine – II. Rondo. Allegro vivace (06:58)
1-3. Robert deMaine – I. Adagio sostenuto e espressivo – Allegro molto più tosto presto (15:24)
1-4. Robert deMaine – II. Rondo. Allegro (08:31)
1-5. Robert deMaine – I. Allegro, ma non tanto (12:29)
1-6. Robert deMaine – II. Scherzo. Allegro molto (05:27)
1-7. Robert deMaine – III. Adagio cantabile – Allegro vivace (08:39)
2-8. Robert deMaine – I. Andante – Allegro vivace (07:28)
2-9. Robert deMaine – II. Adagio – Allegro vivace (07:16)
2-10. Robert deMaine – I. Allegro con brio (06:24)
2-11. Robert deMaine – II. Adagio con molto sentimento d’affetto (08:43)
2-12. Robert deMaine – III. Allegro (04:18)
2-13. Robert deMaine – 12 Variations on a Theme from Handel’s “Judas Maccabaeus”, WoO 45 (12:15)
2-14. Robert deMaine – 12 Variations on “Ein Mädchen oder Weibchen”, Op. 66 (After Mozart’s “Die Zauberflöte”) (09:37)
2-15. Robert deMaine – 7 Variations on “Bei Männern welche Liebe fühlen”, WoO 46 (After Mozart’s “Die Zauberflöte”) (09:17)

Download: