"Besides the well-known Enescu and Ravel works, the two Little Suites of Nikos Skalkottas make this recording attractive. Kadesha and Rimmer present technically impressive and expressive performances."
Pizzicato, 25-9-2017It would be wrong to classify Nikos Skalkottas as a National Romantic composer. However, only certain works such as the Greek Dances for orchestra or the Two Little Suites for violin and piano have kept his name from falling into oblivion. The Two Little Suites reflect a shift in his last creative years: while maintaining typically strict structural control, Skalkottas was nevertheless evolving toward a less complex style......
George Enescu was Romania’s true musical ambassador. He belonged to the first generation of composers born in the relatively young Kingdom of Romania, but left his native land as a seven-year-old child prodigy to study in Vienna, then in Paris: from then on, he led a cosmopolitan life. He would soon become a world-famed celebrity: first as a violinist, soon also as a composer, pianist and conductor. Yehudi Menuhin, his most renowned pupil, referred to Enescu as the most extraordinary human being he ever encountered. Several recordings of Enescu playing the violin have been preserved, including his own Third Violin Sonata with Dinu Lipatti, his godchild, as a sensitive accompanist on the piano......
Begun before the Tzigane but only completed thereafter, the Violin Sonata in G Major was dedicated by Ravel to the above-mentioned Hélène Jourdan-Morhange, a violinist who was both his friend and advisor. In the meantime she had contracted rheumatism in her fingers and could no longer play the sonata in public. None other than George Enescu stepped in to ensure the work’s resounding success in its world première with Ravel at the piano. (Excerpts from the line notes by Johannes Jansen)
JONIAN ILIAS KADESHA has Greek-Albanian roots and lives in Berlin. The young musician not only
speaks Greek, Albanian, German and English but also has a keen interest in philosophy and rhetoric.
His playing is characterized by stylistic accuracy and exactness in his articulation, in the interpretation
of early to contemporary works. With boundless sound imagination Kadesha is always in search of
something new.
He is a prizewinner at Deutscher Musikwettbewerb, Windsor International and the Leopold Mozart
Violin Competition.
The young violinist recently made his debut with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra in the Tivoli Copenhagen,
with the RTE Orchestra at the National Concert Hall Dublin, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra,
the New Russian State Orchestra under Yuri Bashmet and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe at the
Kronberg Festival. Kadesha made his debut with the Athens State Orchestra in autumn 2019 performing
Skalkottas‘ Violin Concerto, whose Small Suites he has recorded for CAvi-music together with works
by Enescu and Ravel.
Kadesha appears in major concert halls and well-known festivals throughout Europe, such as the
London Wigmore Hall, Handelsbeurs Concertzaal Gent, Louvre Paris, Philharmonie Berlin, Salle
Moliere Lyon, Salle Garnier Montecarlo, and the Golden Hall Augsburg as well as the Schubertiade,
the Heidelberger Frühling, the Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, the Boswiler Sommer, Mantua
Chamber Music Festival or the Resonances Festival in Belgium, among others.
He has performed with orchestras such as the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, the
Thessaloniki State Symphony Orchestra, the Philharmonic Orchestras Lübeck and Coburg as well as
the Albanian and Greek radio orchestras.
Chamber music connects him with renowned musicians such as Martha Argerich, Steven Isserlis,
Nicolas Altstaedt, Thomas Demenga and Gábor Takács-Nagy, Ilya Gringolts and Pekka Kuusisto. He
was also heard in Kronberg‘s Chamber Music Connects the World and the Verbier Academy Festival.
Jonian Ilias Kadesha is co-founder of the award-winning Trio Gaspard, which is a regular guest at
music centers in Europe and the USA.
Kadesha studied with Antje Weithaas at the Kronberg Academy. His previous teachers included
Salvatore Accardo, Grigori Zhislin and Ulf Wallin. He studied chamber music with Hatto Beyerle in
Hannover and at the European Chamber Music Academy. Masterclasses with Ferenc Rados, Steven
Isserlis, Ivry Gitlis, Leonidas Kavakos and Eberhard Feltz complete his studies. Since 2018, Kadesha
has been supported by the Young Classical Artists Trust in the United Kingdom.
Kadesha plays a violin by Giovanni Battista Guadagnini (1749), on private loan.
Born in the UK, Nicholas Rimmer studied piano at the Hochschule für Musik in Hannover with Professor Christopher Oakden, and musicology at Cambridge University. He rounded off his training in chamber music with lessons from Wolfram Rieger and the Alban Berg Quartet.
Rimmer was a winner of the ARD German Music Competition on two occasions: in 2006 in a chamber music duo, and in 2010 as a member of the Leibniz Trio. He won the Parkhouse Award in tandem with Nils Mönkemeyer in 2009.
Rimmer has been invited to perform at the festivals of Schleswig-Holstein, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Aldeburgh, Schwetzingen, Ludwigsburg, Lucerne, and Lockenhaus. He has made appearances in renowned music venues such as Wigmore Hall, the Gasteig in Munich, the Tonhalle in Zürich, and the Philharmonie in Berlin. He has performed as soloist with the NDR Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Hamburger Symphoniker and the Neue Lausitzer Philharmonie.
His releases include three successful albums with violist Nils Mönkemeyer and two solo CDs; further- more, his complete recording of the violin works of Wolfgang Rihm with violinist Tianwa Yang for Naxos was awarded the Diapason d’Or, the Pizzicato Supersonic Award and the label ‘Outstanding’ in the International Record Review.
Rimmer is a permanent member of ensembles such as the Trio Gaspard, as well as the Belli-Fischer- Rimmer Trio – a unique, experimental combination of trombone, Percussion and piano. Further chamber music partners include Maximilian Hornung, Nils Mönkemeyer, Lena Neudauer, Gabriel Schwabe and Tianwa Yang. Rimmer is also much in demand as a vocal accompanist: he is a co-founder of the innovative ‘Klangwerk Lied’ series of song recitals which take place in Freiburg. He collaborates on a regular basis with some of the most remarkable members of the new generation of young vocalists, including Ronan Collett, Simon Bode, Sylvia Schwartz, Anna Lucia Richter, and Katharina Persicke.
Besides the well-known Enescu and Ravel works, the two Little Suites of Nikos Skalkottas make this recording attractive. Kadesha and Rimmer present technically impressive and expressive performances.
Pizzicato, 25-9-2017
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