If you listen score-in-hand you’ll doubtless be impressed by the fastidious attention to notated details in cellist Erling Blöndal Bengtsson’s Danacord recordings of Barber, Debussy, and Prokofiev. You’ll seldom find an unheeded dynamic marking or performance direction, and these accounts are strongly underpinned by fine technique, solid musicianship, and ready imagination. This new recording of Samuel Barber’s Cello Sonata (1932) warrants comparison with Raya Garbousova’s pioneering 1947 account (Pearl), and Bengtsson shares her forthright, passionate view of the work. Neither cellist tries to over-dramatize the sonata, unlike Bengtsson’s most recent rival, Shauna Rolston, on CBC’s Musica Viva label. Barber knew what his music needed and he notated everything clearly, so although Rolston is outwardly impressive, her grandiose gestures often falter, and a less rhetorical approach would have made better musical sense. Bengtsson, by contrast, just plays what’s written and needs nothing more.
The same restraint also informs Bengtsson’s un-mannered but fresh-sounding and natural account of the Debussy sonata, also played by Rolston. Debussy’s impressionistic language entrusts more to the instincts of the performer, and Bengtsson gives a convincing and technically superb performance. Finally, in Prokofiev’s Op. 119 sonata the cellist is powerfully assertive throughout a hard-driven reading. Like the other performances here, there’s unwavering rhythmic control, too, and the performance has none of the more self-indulgent license you get from the Yo-Yo Ma/Emanuel Ax Sony collaboration. Impressive.
