Chouchane Siranossian - Tartini: Violin Concertos - BBC Music Magazine

Recording 4*
Performance 4*

It is Tartini's distinctive gifts as an expressive composer which are foremost in his concertos, almost all of which are for his own instrument, the violin. Chouchane Siranossian has chosen four works from well over a hundred surviving violin concertos. In addition she plays another which she recently identified and brought to public attention, and which here receives its first recording. It is an immediately engaging piece in G major whose opening movement is characterised by dance-like ritornellos. The E minor Andante which follows is pensive, lyrical and tenderly expressed while the concluding movement returns to the spirited dance gestures of the opening. Marked Allegretto it is a unique appearance of this tempo marking among Tartini's concertos.

Of the remaining concertos the D minor, D45 and the A major, D96 are the best known. Slow movements were very often focal points of Tartini's concertos and each of these provides outstanding examples of his expressive powers. Sometimes he provided alternative slow movements, one of which he might consider definitive. Such is the case with the A major Concerto where Siranossian has chosen Tartini's appended Largo andante. This poetic piece is accompanied by a motto — another Tartini trait —A rivi, afonti, afiume, correte amare lacrime, sin tanto the consumi, l'acerbo mio dolor (like streams, springs, rivers, flow bitter tears until my cruel grief is spent).

In summary, here is a rewarding disc with an important new addition. Siranossian is an accomplished violinist who stylishly and unaffectedly responds to the lyrical character of slow movements, if on occasion a little too weightily partnered in the outer movements by the strings of the Venice Baroque Orchestra under its director Andrea Marcon.