SEATTLE — Two of North America’s foremost soloists, violinist James Ehnes and pianist Orion Weiss, joined forces here to present Beethoven’s 10 sonatas for violin and piano. Sponsored by the Seattle Chamber Music Society, of which Ehnes is artistic director, the musicians split the sonatas between concerts Dec. 6 and 8. I attended the first installment, when the duo performed the first five sonatas in the acoustically superior, 536-seat Nordstrom Recital Hall within the far larger Benaroya Hall.
Beethoven wrote his first three violin-piano sonatas, which comprise Op. 12, in 1797-1798, in his mid-twenties; the last, Op. 96, dates from 1812, when he was 42. As such, the 10 sonatas may not reflect the entirety of his compositional growth, but they nonetheless exhibit the increasing development of his individual voice. The first three show the influence of earlier composers, including Haydn, Mozart, and his teacher, Salieri, while the later scores increasingly convey the weight and profundity we associate with the mature Beethoven.
It’s impossible to listen to the earliest sonatas without feeling, again and again, that Beethoven was taking immense delight in discovering how many times he could compose variations on a theme or illuminate the dialogue between violin and piano. Yet despite their abundance of lighthearted and playful passages, Weiss hurtled into them with outsized intensity and seriousness. Technically, his pianism was beyond reproach. Waterfall runs were ideally fluid, and the huge demands of the third sonata were met with absolute precision, vigor, and energy to spare. But not once did his sound convey delight in the dialogue between the piano’s low and high registers and the many instances of call and response between piano and violin. Instead, his approach was one of relentless virtuosity. He often seemed unwilling to let go, lighten up, smile, and take joy in the sheer act of creation.
For his part, Ehnes seemed content (or resigned) to go along with the ride. In the slower middle movements of the second and third sonatas, which allowed him to sink deeper into his inherently beautiful sound, he confirmed his greatness with tones perfect, poised, glowing, and gorgeous. But as soon as the pace picked up, as in the opening movement of the third sonata, it was off to the races all over again. As much as Ehnes’ singing tone in the third sonata’s moving central Adagio touched the heart and Weiss sufficiently lightened up to produce lovely chimes behind and around him, it was left mainly to the violinist to supply the vulnerability at the movement’s core. Ehnes and Weiss made the most of the final movement, leaving one in awe of their virtuosity.
It’s impossible to know to what extent the opportunity to relax during the intermission break or perhaps come down from an initial jolt of caffeine may have played a part, but the two artists hit their groove in the fourth and fifth sonatas. This time, their intensity seemed ideal for the start of the Sonata No. 4 in A minor, Op. 23. While Weiss could have contributed a bit of joy to the middle movement Adagio, nothing could detract from the mesmerizing fragility of Ehnes’ musicianship. The final Allegro molto represented a triumphant marriage of gravity and virtuosity.
Spring, as the Sonata No. 5 in F major, Op. 24, was named by someone after Beethoven’s death, arrived rather rapidly, with each new bloom bursting open faster than anyone could possibly inhale its fragrance. In the marvelous second movement Adagio cantabile, a few harmonic figures point forward to the Adagio in Schubert’s posthumously published cello quintet; Ehnes’ glowing highs were like a portal to heaven. Although the last movement could have benefited from a more rousing conclusion, the duo’s winning recapitulation of the “Spring” melody propelled enough audience members to their feet to merit an encore. Their treatment of the middle-movement Adagio from the Violin Sonata No. 6 in A major, Op. 20, No. 1, was as beautiful as it gets.
