Alberto Williams - Violin Sonatas Nos 2 and 3

Alberto WILLIAMS (1862–1952)

Violin Sonata No.2 in D minor, Op.51 (1906)

Violin Sonata No.3 in D major, Op.53 (1907)

Duo AM

Alejandro Aldana (Violin)

Fabio Martino (Piano)

Recorded 28 February to 2 March 2022,at Hans-Rosbaud-Studio, SWR, Baden-Baden, Germany

Alberto Williams is described in the first Grove’s Dictionary of Music and Musicians as ‘the grand old man of Argentine music’, while also fulfilling the occupations of educationist, poet and philosopher. Of Basque descent, Williams was the grandson of an Englishman, and his extended family included Amancio Alcorta, a notable composer in Argentina’s early classical music development in the first half of the 19th century.

Williams was born in Buenos Aires in November 1862. He died in the same city nearly 90 years later having devoted much of his life to music. By the age of eight he was already composing and performing at the piano, securing a musical education at the Conservatorio de la Provincia de Buenos Aires. In 1882 the Argentine government sent him to the Paris Conservatoire. There he studied piano with Georges Mathias, a student of Chopin, and Charles Wilfrid de Bériot. With Émile Durand, Benjamin Godard and Ernest Guiraud he explored harmony and counterpoint, and with César Franck he received intensive training in composition. Returning to Argentina in 1889, he directed orchestral concerts at the Ateneo, and in 1893 founded the Conservatoire de Buenos Aires, now the Alberto Williams Conservatoire. The success of this institution was reflected in the formation of more than one hundred branches subsequently founded in towns across Argentina.

Williams’ compositions fall into three stylistic periods. The first covers the Paris years and shows the ability to write in established classical forms. The second builds on this, marking his return to Argentina with a wish to weave more of his home country’s fabric into the training he had received. This he did with the integration of folk song, reaching the public with his first notable success, the piano piece El rancho abandonado. Part of the suite En la sierra, Op. 32 (‘In Hill Country’), it is a lament for the pampas, quoting a huella folk song. Music of huella and milonga origin assumed an important part in Williams’ music at this time, though following the publication of his second symphony in 1910 more modern compositional techniques assumed greater importance. This marked the start of the third and longest period.

Williams completed nine symphonies in total, part of an orchestral output also including four suites, three symphonic poems and suites of Argentinian dances for strings. He also wrote prolifically for the piano, completing more than 150 pieces, many reflecting national dances, while his chamber works include a piano trio, flute sonata and cello sonata.

Dominating his chamber music output, however, are three sonatas for violin and piano, published in consecutive years between 1905 and 1907. Though they are placed towards the end of his ‘national’ phase, the works inevitably draw comparison with the celebrated Violin Sonata of his teacher Franck, written while Williams was studying with the Belgian composer in 1886. While those parallels certainly ring true, the writing has a heroic grandeur reflecting the post-Wagnerian compositions of Paris in that time. Williams also has a penchant for concentrated interplay between violin and piano, such as that enjoyed in the sonatas of Brahms. In his time in Paris, Williams would also have experienced the early musical thoughts of Claude Debussy, and there are hints of new discoveries in his use of whole-tone scales, parallel chords and more exotic harmonies, relishing the opportunity for a more experimental approach.

Published in 1906, the Violin Sonata No. 2 in D minor is set out in four movements, sharing its structure and key with the third violin sonata of Brahms. Certainly, the older composer is audible in the solemn dialogue with which the Moderato begins, and also the establishment of the Allegro maestoso, where flowing piano and rich violin enjoy a fluent musical conversation. A lighter and slightly whimsical second subject offers more room before animated development of the themes, the piano glowering in its lower register. The movement ends in heroic mood, with an emphatic and triumphant coda in the major key.

 

The second movement, subtitled Vidalita, turns towards music of creole origin from the northern region of Argentina. It begins with an attractive, thoughtful phrase from the piano, taken up by the violin in soft, confidential tones. Soon this grows to a passionate, Franckian outpouring, before the harmonies switch to the minor key and a slight shadow falls over the music. The ending is serene, a long held note from the violin.

The third movement, a Menuetto, offers a lighter and more playful profile in its triple time lilt, before growing into an assertive musical statement. The violin enjoys some songful, bird-like trills, preening a little, while the piano assumes a quasi-orchestral profile in response. Williams then employs a relatively short finale, with affectionate melodies assigned to the violin and a flowing piano, now in the tonic major. An exultant coda finishes the work in high spirits.

The Violin Sonata No. 3 in D major, published in 1907, finds Williams working in ambitious dimensions. Two outer movements of substantial weight, adhering to sonata form, frame a double-barrelled central movement of Scherzo and Romanza. Harmonically the writing is more adventurous, with the home key of D major not immediately evident in the Allegro non troppo as the violin’s melodies use whole tones, straining at the leash as they look to explore further. A restless mood persists, heightened by syncopated rhythms and full-bodied harmonies from the piano.

By contrast the second theme becomes the dominant feature of the movement, a chorale led by the violin but prompted by a striking shift in harmony from the piano halfway through. The accompaniment is initially sensitive, but Williams lets the piano loose on several occasions with concerto-like outbursts, its more overt displays of passion complementing the violin’s tender melody.

The second movement takes flight, working in triple time with an attractive, Schubertian dance figure traded between the two instruments. Presently we are led into a tender Romanza in B minor, the violin making more lyrical plays over a soft accompaniment. When this material returns, it is transformed to a feverish melody in long phrases from the violin, the pealing bells in the virtuosic piano part redolent of Liszt. Finally, the triple time figure returns, a spring in its step once again.

The third movement takes the form of a dance, with syncopations that give us a fleeting look into Williams’ Argentinian soul, featuring whole tone melodies from the violin. The movement alternates between exploratory phrases and big, assertive declarations, save for a furtive second idea that appears sheepishly on the violin. The music then gathers itself for a big finish, peals of octaves ringing out from either extreme of the piano to support the long melodic phrases from the violin. The sonata ends with a triumphant coda.

Ben Hogwood