Beethoven & Barber: Violin Concertos

American violinist Stella Chen bridges the 19th and 20th centuries in this terrific concerto pairing. Her take on the long opening movement of Beethoven’s Violin Concerto is luxuriantly expansive, relishing the music’s limpid pastoral overtones and the warmly lyrical writing for the solo instrument. Her tone is alluringly ripe, intonation faultless, and her interpretation as a whole glows with an irresistible sense of well-being and affection. Chen’s poetic instincts transfer seamlessly to the coupling, the Violin Concerto of her compatriot Samuel Barber. She soars in the expansive melodic lines at the piece’s opening, while movingly distilling the poignancy of the impassioned slow movement. The hell-for-leather finale is notoriously tricky for the soloist, but Chen is unflappable, chiselling out important detail skimmed over by lesser violinists. Fiery support is lent by the Academy of St Martin in the Fields orchestra and conductor Jean-Jacques Kantorow, who partner sympathetically throughout.