Ramón Paús: Works for Viola - Yuval Gotlibovich, Raquel Castro, Eduardo Fernández, ESMUC Chamber Choir, Catalan Chamber Orchestra, Joan Pàmies

Naxos 8.573602

Madera Ocaso Wood Sunset

The following review is an excerpt from Strings Attached (February 2018) which can be read in its entirety here.

There’s music by the contemporary Spanish composer Ramón Paús on Works for Viola, featuring the Israeli violist Yuval Gotlibovich, in the NaxosSpanish Classics series (8.573602). Paús, born in 1959, has worked extensively in the film, theatre and television worlds as well as the classical field.

Gotlibovich is joined by pianist Eduardo Fernández in Madera Ocaso (Wood Sunset) (2013), an extensive single-movement rhapsodic piece with modern touches and a very strong piano part. The Catalan Chamber Orchestra under Joan Pàmies form the accompaniment for the even more rhapsodic Cobalto azul, en tránsito (Cobalt blue, in transit) (2013), and the same performers are joined by violinist Raquel Castro and the ESMUC Chamber Choir male voices in the quite beautiful Elegía primera, la deriva (First elegy, the drift) (2014), an effective and moving work focusing on extreme loss. Gotlibovich displays a warm and beautiful tone throughout the instrument’s range.

Madera Ocaso was written for these two performers and Gotlibovich also gave the first performance of the other two works, the recording sessions for the Elegia primera beginning the day after its November 2015 premiere in Barcelona.