Parnassus Records returns to international availability some of the earliest recordings by cellist János Starker, one of the 20th century’s most prominent instrumentalists and one of the most popular of the LP and late 78rpm era.
An unmissable insight into cellist János Starker’s early work, featuring a performance of Kodály’s Solo Cello Sonata that’s ‘truly sensational’
—Rob Cowan, Gramophone April 2023 Editor’s Choice
While Starker is perhaps best-known for his recordings for Mercury Living Presence, he was active in the studio for well over a decade before the stereo era. The present release contains some of Starker’s hardest-to-find recordings for two long-defunct independent American labels whose recordings are sough by serious collectors – Period, an independent LP-era label of the early 1950s, and Pacific, active in the postwar 78 era. For Pacific, Starker recorded Zoltán Kodály’s Sonata for solo cello, Op. 8, which won the highly coveted Grand Prix du Disque in 1949 and brought Starker to international attention as an artist of the top rank.
All of the recordings in this edition have been newly remastered by Steve Smolian.
