Shostakovich’s Viola Sonata was his last work, composed in 1975 in the hospital where he died. Performers have naturally tended to treat it with great reverence, but hand the score to a new generation of musicians and it can sound very different. Grigori Frid was a lesser-known but much longer lived contemporary of Shostakovich, best known for his work as a teacher. His short First Viola Sonata, dating from 1971, opens in a tranquil and elegiac mood leading to a highly conflicted Allegro before concluding with a long deeply affecting lament from the solo viola. Henk Badings is a Dutch composer from the same generation, who has found a great advocate in Dana Zemtsov with her recording of Dutch Hidden Gems.
