Home listening - Bach, Beethoven and two great violinists

The Guardian 0

Tremendous new releases from Kati Debretzeni and Leonidas Kavakos, plus 50 years of the Met on BBC Four

• Violinists who specialise in baroque music don’t tend to get the same limelight as those playing big romantic concertos, but their virtuosity deserves equal recognition. Kati Debretzeni, born in Transylvania, based in London, has led the English Baroque Soloists since 2000. She is also a leader of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and has directed numerous ensembles around the world. Debretzeni is soloist, scholar and inspiration in Bach Violin Concertos (SDG), with the English Baroque Soloists conducted by John Eliot Gardiner. In addition to the well-known concertos in A minor, BMV 1041, and E major, BWV 1042, she has explored two others, the disputed D minor, BMV 1052 and, in her own arrangement, the D major concerto, after BMV 1053 (a reworking of the second harpsichord concerto). Debretzeni’s joyful, spirited playing, precise but free, gives endless pleasure.

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