Raphaela Gromes & Julian Riem - Richard Strauss: Cello Sonatas (2020) [Official Digital Download 24/96]

Only few cellists are as inspiring as Raphaela Gromes: her cello playing is virtuosic and vibrant, full of passion and technically brilliant, versatile and charming at the same time. She fascinates her audience as soloist as well as duo-partner or member of a wind-quartet, her performance being fantastically challenging and extraordinarily light-footed.

She captivates her audience with her delightful play: “With the first sound she creates incredible intimacy, her performance being very private, not one note being just “made””, this is how the “Süddeutsche Zeitung” describes her appearance with the Münchner Symphoniker in 2018. “With a slightly hoarse tune she interprets music, senses it. (…) Gromes inspires with her bliss, pairs earthiness with feathery excursions. In her first cadenza she experiments with interesting dissonant intervals, discards them only to present stupendous virtuosity to return to tonal exegesis and again and again creates moments of pure poetry.”

Raphaela Gromes’ appearances with her duo partner at the piano, Julian Riem, are being celebrated as perfect duets. “In fact, they find a new, own way of interpreting instrumental duets: Gromes’ and Riem’s chamber music is symbiotic”, “Die Presse” enthuses after their performance in the Vienna Konzerthaus. Alongside her permanent duo-partner Julian Riem, Christian Altenburger, Isabelle von Keulen, Alexander Lubimov, Patrick Demenga and Mischa Maisky are Gromes’ partners for chamber music.

After her first recording for Faro Classics in 2016, she released her highly praised first album as SONY Classical exclusive artist in fall 2017. Accompanied on the piano by Julian Riem, „Serenata Italiana” she interprets works of the late Romantic composers Giuseppe Martucci, Leone Sinigaglia, Ferrucio B. Busoni and Mario Castelnuovo. Her second album „Hommage à Rossini“ for SONY, released in November 2018 and her third album with the title “Offenbach” released in May 2019 for the 200th anniversary of the composer entered several times the top ten of the the classical charts. “Richard Strauss – Cello Sonatas” is the fourth album with her duo partner Julian Riem to be released in February 2020. As in her previous albums, Raphaela Gromes presents a world premiere recording with the original version of the Strauss Sonata op.6.

Tracklist:
01. Cello Sonata in F Major, [Op. 6, TrV 115], 1st Version I. Allegro con brio
02. Cello Sonata in F Major, [Op. 6, TrV 115], 1st Version II. Andante ma non troppo
03. Cello Sonata in F Major, [Op. 6, TrV 115], 1st Version III. Finale. Allegro vivo
04. 8 Gedichte aus Letzte Blatter, Op. 10, TrV 141 I. Zueignung (Arr. for Cello and Piano by Julian Riem)
05. 8 Gedichte aus Letzte Blatter, Op. 10, TrV 141 III. Die Nacht (Arr. for Cello and Piano by Julian Riem)
06. Schlichte Weisen, Op. 21, TrV 160 II. Du meines Herzens Kronelein (Arr. for Cello and Piano by Julian Riem)
07. Schlichte Weisen, Op. 21, TrV 160 III. Ach Lieb, ich muss nun scheiden (Arr. for Cello and Piano by Julian Riem)
08. 4 Lieder, Op. 27, TrV 170 II. Cacilie (Arr. for Cello and Piano by Julian Riem)
09. 4 Lieder, Op. 27, TrV 170 IV. Morgen! (Arr. for Cello and Piano by Julian Riem)
10. Cello Sonata in F Major, Op. 6, TrV 115, 2nd Version I. Allegro con brio
11. Cello Sonata in F Major, Op. 6, TrV 115, 2nd Version II. Andante ma non troppo
12. Cello Sonata in F Major, Op. 6, TrV 115, 2nd Version III. Finale. Allegro vivo
13. Der Rosenkavalier, Op. 59, TrV 227 Walzerfolge (Arr. for Cello and Piano by Julian Riem)

Personnel:
Raphaela Gromes, cello
Julian Riem, piano