The title
Ysaÿe Impressions that buyers may see on the cover of the physical CD or in online listings is a bit misleading; what's recorded here are not a group of pieces called Impressions, or a variety of works, but the Sonatas for violin solo, Op. 27. These six pieces, after years of neglect, have become popular once again, with new recordings appearing from mostly young violinists. The appeal of the sonatas to younger players may have to do with their musical language: just as distinctive as the mind-bending virtuosity of the music (many passages could hardly be guessed to be for a single violin) is its stylistic pastiche. This is not simply a question of the potpourri type of composition that was still common enough in 1923, when these sonatas were composed. Ysaÿe's conception of structure is closer to what fans of contemporary popular music might call a mash-up. Consider the first movement of the Sonata No. 2 in A minor, Op. 27/2 (track 5), where one of the themes from Bach's Partita No. 3 for solo violin, BWV 1006, is interwoven with the Dies irae chant melody. The general trend among players has been to take this as, to use modern parlance once again, extreme violin. But Polish violinist
Wojciech Koprowski lets the music speak for itself; the Dies irae emerges from the texture with clarity but no special emphasis. Throughout, as Ysaÿe explores various phases of musical history and even the styles of his violin-playing contemporaries,
Koprowski relies on technical mastery of the music -- no small feat -- rather than exaggeration of details to draw attention to them. There's some evidence that Ysaÿe himself, who was recorded a few times, tended toward a more dramatic approach, but
Koprowski deserves credit for running counter to type, and this is certainly a more-than-competent reading of some pieces that seem to take the whole cultural inheritance of the early 20th century and place it on the four strings of a single violin.