Cellist Shauna Rolston and pianist Bernadene Blaha unite on this disc to give us a varied assortment of the cello and piano repertoire. The pieces chosen span nearly 100 years of composition, from the Strauss Sonata from 1883 to the Lutoslawski Metamorphoses of 1981. Despite the various compositional periods visited, Rolston's sound and approach to her instrument do not change along with the piece. This is truly a shame because the result is some of the works being extremely successful while others are much less so. At the ...
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Cellist Shauna Rolston and pianist Bernadene Blaha unite on this disc to give us a varied assortment of the cello and piano repertoire. The pieces chosen span nearly 100 years of composition, from the Strauss Sonata from 1883 to the Lutoslawski Metamorphoses of 1981. Despite the various compositional periods visited, Rolston's sound and approach to her instrument do not change along with the piece. This is truly a shame because the result is some of the works being extremely successful while others are much less so. At the top of the list of pieces that work well is the Debussy Sonata. Rolston's technique is quite impressive and as such all of the nuance and subtly that Debussy calls for in the cello part is immediately evident. The intensity of Rolston's sound and vibrato also work very well in this sonata. Blaha's performance is also fluid and spacious. The other two successful works are the Lutoslawski and the Messiaen, two very slow compositions that really test a performer's sound continuity and...
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