“Kodama captures that sense of scale in a performance that’s both fiery and thoughtful.”

“Mari Kodama has long been fascinated by the love, friendship and music of this creative trio, and explores it here from Brahms’s point of view, opening with an energetic account of the Piano Sonata No. 1, which he played for the Schumanns in those early meetings. Robert wrote that the younger composer’s playing made his sonatas sound like ‘veiled symphonies’; Kodama captures that sense of scale in a performance that’s both fiery and thoughtful.

[…] It’s a work shot through with melancholy, beautifully handled here by Kodama who’s even more in her stride than in the Sonata, and she dances through the variations’ alternating moods without ever losing a sense of balance and architecture.”

 

Read the full review from BBC Classical Music Magazine, following the release of Mari Kodama’s album New Paths,