Janine Jansen and Jean-Yves Thibaudet play Grieg, Debussy, and Chausson

Violin superstar Janine Jansen, piano virtuoso Jean-Yves Thibaudet, and the award-winning Dover Quartet light up Carnegie Hall with a concert of chamber music works by Grieg, Debussy, and Chausson.

Over the course of the 2017–2018 season, the charismatic Jansen performed with chamber groups and orchestras as part of her Perspectives series, a residency at Carnegie Hall. In this fourth concert of the series, Jansen is joined by expert chamber partners Thibaudet and the Dover Quartet for a program pairing violin sonatas by Grieg and Debussy with Chausson's rarely performed jewel, the Concert for Violin, Piano, and String Quartet.

The evening begins with Grieg's Violin Sonata No. 2, a cheerful work suffused with allusions to the rich musical traditions of the composer's native Norway. Debussy's Violin Sonata was similarly touched by its creator's love of his homeland's musical heritage. His last completed work, the sonata is filled with what the composer himself called “a joyous tumult” seemingly at odds with the fatal illness from which he was suffering during the sonata's composition. Following the intermission, Jansen and Thibaudet are joined by the Dover Quartet for Chausson's Romantic Concert for Violin, Piano, and String Quartet. For the work's title, tempo markings, and general character, Chausson drew on the achievements of French Baroque masters like Rameau and Couperin, harkening back to the 18th-century aesthetic he so admired.

Janine Jansen appears courtesy of Decca.
Photos: © 2018 Steve J. Sherman

Discover Janine Jansen's album Brahms & Bartók, released on the Decca label: