Hi-Res Downloads

96kHz/24-bit; FLAC, Sony Classical 88843093012 (supplied by www.highresaudio.com)

You don’t get a booklet PDF with this download so you’ll need to see the web page for full track details. Obviously, there’s the Chopin Cello Sonata and the Grand Duo he co-wrote with cellist and friend Auguste Franchomme. Track 9 is a Nocturne by him, track 8 his setting of Chopin’s Op.15:1. The Étude, track 7, is Glazunov’s transcription of Chopin’s Op.25:7, and there’s an early Polonaise brillante. Transfer level is unusually high for these recordings but pianist and cellist are well balanced – the latter never swamped by her French partner’s forte playing. In HFN Mar ’13 (Duo – p94) I admired Gabetta’s ‘imagination and sense of colour’ and she’s the more compelling artist here too. There is something faintly ‘deferential’ with Chamayou’s playing, I felt, notwithstanding the matched phrasing throughout. CB

Sound Quality: 80%

Hi-Fi News Lab Report

With no information forthcoming about the recording itself, spectral examination suggests this download is either taken from an analogue master (more likely) or is an asymmetric downsample of a DSD recording to 96kHz LPCM. PM