Nigel Coombes

Violinist Coombes explains things perfectly in his hilarious liner notes. Beethoven, he says, realized that the piano and violin sound horrible together, the instruments literally hate each other, and gave up after ten sonatas. "For us to try and surmount Beethoven's problems, for example, in the heat of trying to make the music up as we go along is almost laughable." Nonetheless, a blindfold test of this record to a knowledgeable listener often results in the music being misidentified as…