One finds in Paul Hindemith's Sonata for Solo Cello (Opus 25, No. 3) two particular qualities: the kind of brash gestures that characterized the composer's early works, and the idiomatic surety that each of his individual instrumental studies exemplifies. Having mastered the various instrumental idioms early on, works such as the Sonata for Solo Cello differ from his later undertakings in terms of style much more than in maturity.

Composed in the same year as his famous Suite 1922 (for piano), the Sonata for Solo Cello is one of three sonatas for solo string instruments included in his Opus 25. (The others include a sonata for solo viola, another for viola and piano, and a "Little Sonata" for Viola d'Amore and Piano.) The piece was apparently quick work: four of the five movements were said to have been composed in a single day. Likewise, the practical spirit of Gebrauchsmusik (translated roughly, "music for use") inhabits the music in the way the lines seem to explore the contours of the instrument's capabilities. Despite his creative expediency, Hindemith's careful consideration of the instrument's "physiology" allows him to establish a continuum between execution and expression, and a stronger connection between the performer's hands and his/her head.

The five rather short movements are arranged in a somewhat symmetrical fashion: two relatively longer movements bookend the composition, while a pair of tiny fast movements surround the long, slow movement at the work's center. From the outset, the opening movement carves sharp angles, highlighted by strained double stops and extreme registral shifts. The player seems to spend much time stirring restlessly on the lower strings, despite more melodic entreaties from the upper range. The second movement, though still shadowy, is lighter on its feet, with a coy tune embellished by occasional turns and trills. The long central movement indulges in broad strokes of languorous melody, seemingly torn between launching into heartwrenching lament and succumbing to banal accompanimental figures. The fourth movement is by far the most lively, but its quick triplets expend their energy in less than a minute; the final movement turns to weightier matters, the player again grinding away at the lower strings much of the time. Here again, dark chordal sawings from the bottom range engage in dialogue with more lyrical lines in the treble area, the two finally reaching an uneasy consensus on a perfunctory pizzicato note. Hindemith thus seems to act out in the music itself his own efforts to breach the divide between the physical and the emotional.

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