The Week in Reviews, Op. 482: Lisa Batiashvili, Gil Shaham, Gary Levinson

January 7, 2025, 2:52 PM · In an effort to promote the coverage of live violin performance, Violinist.com each week presents links to reviews of notable concerts and recitals around the world.

Violinist Lisa Batiashvili. Photo by Elizabeth Asher, courtesy of the LA Phil.

Lisa Batiashvili performed the Beethoven Violin Concerto with the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

Violinist.com: "Nothing seemed to stop the momentum that she created in any given passage, it felt sure and inevitable, all with expertly calibrated dynamics."
San Francisco Classical Voice: "Drawing a light, sweet tone from her 1739 Guarneri del Gesù violin, Batiashvili’s characterization was committed to exploring every hill and crevice of the score."

Gil Shaham performed Dvorák's Violin Concerto in A minor with the Czech Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall.

Bach Track: "His remarkable ability to spin and caress melodies found an ideal vehicle for expression in Dvorák's score. Whether melancholic or merry, Shaham's violin was never overly assertive, and the dialogues with the woodwinds remained consistently well balanced, with bravura never being the objective."

Gary Levinson, violist Iakov Zats, pianist Anton Nel and cellist Robert deMaine performed for the Chamber Music Society of Fort Worth.

Texas Classical Review: "Levinson and cellist Robert deMaine provided a bravura bonus piece with Johan Halvorsen’s arrangement of the passacaglia from Handel’s Harpsichord Suite in G Minor. The piece unfurled like a series of cascading waves as the two players infused successive iterations of the underlying harmonic pattern with florid scalar runs, dazzling arpeggios, rapid-fire pizzicato gestures, and ardent melodies in the fervent adagio section."

Boston Baroque performed a New Year's concert with its outgoing founder and music director Martin Pearlman.

The Boston Musical Intelligencer: "Major-minor schemes and happy-sad themes resonated in fuller force than usual as Boston Baroque’s leader retires at the season’s end."

Violist Choong-Jin Chang performed Martinu’s Rhapsody-Concerto with the Philadelphia Orchestra (in October).

The Strad: "The piece is more contemplative than virtuosic, though Chang’s expertise in the florid passages gave him more than a few show-stopping moments."

Isabelle Faust performed "Follow Me" by Ondrej Adámek with the London Symphony Orchestra (in October).

The Strad: "At a time when violin concerto writing often feels boxed in by lack of imagination or development, both Adámek and Faust showed that the grammar of modernism can still reinvent old forms and tell new stories for our time."

The Dover Quartet performed works by Dvorák, Jessie Montgomery, Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate and Pura Fé at the Curtis Institute of Music (in October).

The Strad: "At this point, Jessie Montgomery’s Strum (2006) is perhaps an early candidate for ‘classic,’ given the frequency of performances....Tate translated Fé’s timbres for string quartet, and his reinterpretation gives vibrant new life to the original’s gently percussive results....If anything, the Dvorák gained even more poignancy from the fascinating preface."

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