Pablo Ferrández’ Sony Classical Debut Album

A little over a week ago Sony Classics released Reflections, the debut album of Spanish cellist Pablo Ferrández. A few days earlier Ferrández had presented a video preview of the album, which now has its own YouTube Web page. His accompanist for that preview was pianist Denis Kozhukhin, who is also accompanist on the new album.

The entire album offers an engaging interweaving of Spanish and Russian composers, reflecting the nationalities of both soloist and accompanist. The centerpiece of the album is Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Opus 19 G minor sonata, whose first edition named the piece as a sonata for piano and cello:

Cover page of Rachmaninoff’s Opus 19 sonata (from IMSLP, public domain)

Indeed, while there is no skimping on virtuosity in the cello part, the piano part certainly cannot be dismissed as mere accompaniment. After all, Rachmaninoff could not help being Rachmaninoff; and he did give the premiere performance with cellist Anatoliy Brandukov, to whom the sonata was dedicated. The recording thus provides a highly satisfying account of the thoroughly engaging partnership of Ferrández and Kozhukhin.

The sonata is flanked on both sides by shorter pieces by Rachmaninoff and two Spanish composers, Manuel de Falla and Enrique Granados. Many of these were originally vocal compositions; and, for the two selections from Rachmaninoff’s Opus 21 selection of twelve songs, Ferrández appears to be playing straight from the vocal line, since no arranger is listed. Indeed, all four of the shorter Rachmaninoff selections demonstrated clearly and movingly that this composer was not all about keyboard virtuosity and was perfectly capable of more intimate approaches to expressiveness.

The Spanish selections, on the other hand, were just as intimate but not necessarily as expressive. Falla was represented by Maurice Maréchal’s arrangements of two of the songs from the Siete canciones populares españolas (seven Spanish folk songs), both of which were faithful to the source but were not as convincing as the original vocal versions. Somewhat more convincing was “Oriental,” the second in the 12 danzas españolas (twelve Spanish dances) collection for solo piano by Enrique Granados. This was arranged for cello and piano by Gregor Piatigorsky, who did not neglect the pianistic side of Granados’ score but still gave the cello a “voice” worthy of the foreground.

The album concludes with a favorite encore among cellists. This is Pablo Casals’ arrangement of the traditional Catalan song “El Cant dels Ocells” (the song of the birds). Casals could not resist indulging in a few avian “special effects;” but the music still holds high encore status. The music is scored for solo cello, and Ferrández’ account is definitely as satisfying as any I have heard at the end of a cello recital.