Ibérica disc reviewed in Classic FM magazine

Music by de Falla, Cassadó & Granados

*** (3 stars)
Anne Gastinel (cello), Pablo Márquez (guitar)

 

French cellist Anne Gastinel, who made her mark performing Schubert and Schumann, wants to penetrate the 'soul of Spanish music' in this recital disc with guitarist Pablo Márquez. She makes a decent job of it, too: performing music by de Falla, Granados and the lesser-known Gaspar Cassadó, her cello breathes with the exuberant melodic inflections and clattering rhythms that characterise Spanish folk music. Nothing wrong with the playing then, but the music itself is cut disappointingly thin. Show-stopping extracts from de Falla's El Amor Brujo aside, Granados and Cassadó feel like variations on the same old idiomatic hooks. PC