Johannes Brahms: The Five Sonatas for Violin & Piano – Volume 2 (SACD Album) – Johannes Brahms

Wallin and Pontinen open with ‘Sonata No. 2 in E-flat major, Op. 120’, composed in 1894 for clarinet and transcribed for the violin a year later. As the clarinet part extends further down than the lowest note on the violin, Brahms made considerable revisions to the clarinet part, which entailed changes in the piano part, and consequently the printing of a new piano score. This is followed by the second and third violin sonatas, in A major and D minor respectively. Both works were composed during the summer of 1886 in Thun in Switzerland and are clearly related, even though they inhabit completely different expressive worlds.