PRESS

SOLITUDE: REVIEWS

  • “(In) Ysaÿe’s Sonata No 6 Sir’s technical and artistic prowess is on full show. It’s an electric performance: slick and moody in the best of ways, rhythmic and taut to its core. Her violin, particularly its middle range, glows.”

    Gramophone, Mark Seow, July 2022

  • “stylistic flair and versatility”

    “elegance”

    “flawless and authoritative”

    “utterly majestic”

    “Acknowledging the importance of the listener, Sir’s thoughtful and sincere sleeve notes frame the collection. This is elegant, refined and authoritative musicianship in action.”

    ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐/⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ BBC Music Magazine, Ingrid Pearson, June 2022

  • "It is all superbly well played in a close and slightly reverberant recording."

    The Strad, Tim Homfray, July 2022

  • “I never previously imagined that I’d enjoy solo string music so much. Sir’s version of Ysaÿe’s Sonata No. 6 is terrific, a performance which draws you in with a wink and a grin.”

    “Sir brings out the music’s humour.”

    The Arts Desk, Graham Rickson, August 2022

CHACONNES, DIVERTIMENTO & RHAPSODIES: REVIEWS

  • "I love the filigreed, gossamer-weight nimbleness brought by both Sir and pianist Irina Andrievsky to the interludes Stravinsky wrote for his friend Samuel Dushkin on Tchaikovsky's The Fairy's Kiss... you can't fail to be impressed by the sensitivity and restraint - indeed, the Mendelssohnian chamber lightness - with which Andrievsky sets to her task here. Add Sir's own gentle purity, and the pair manage to realise the highest points of the work's emotional architecture without ever overdoing things. So, while the album's opening may feel like the most difficult piece for 21st-century sensibilities to get on board with, it's probably also the disc's greatest achievement."

    Gramophone, Charlotte Gardner, July 2019

  • "Suites & Fantasies were the mainstay of Joo Yeon Sir's intelligently-devised 2017 debut disc, and the sequel (Chaconnes, Divertimento & Rhapsodies) is just as artfully conceived."

    ⭐⭐⭐/⭐⭐⭐⭐ BBC Music Magazine, Paul Riley, August 2019

  • "it's a well-programmed tribute to different duos of composers and violinists... lovely playing...it's the kind of imaginative album a new generation of young classical performers is creating."

    BBC Radio 3 Record Review, Andrew McGregor, June 2019

SUITES & FANTASIES: REVIEWS

  • "A dazzling debut. Joo Yeon Sir clearly has a bright future. This young player melds technical assurance with rare artistic sensibility in this showcase album... She displays real poise in her reading of Schnittke' nostalgic Suite in the Old Style, grit and determination in Britten Suite for Violin and Piano and dash and verve in Darius Milhaud's hilariously helter-skelter Le boeuf sur le toit... Irina Andrievsky makes an ideal partner at the keyboard..."

    ⭐⭐⭐⭐ The Observer, Stephen Pritchard, June 2017

  • "This first disc by the young British Korean Joo Yeon Sir is impressive, showcasing a firm-toned, agile and fearless playing style by a violinist who is willing to take risks on unfamiliar works, and who has a clear rapport with her pianist, Irina Andrievsky..."

    ⭐⭐⭐/⭐⭐⭐⭐ BBC Music Magazine, Erica Jeal, August 2017

  • "She turns phrases elegantly, ably supported by Irina Andrievsky's stylish piano accompaniment... Britten charts a course between charm and abrasiveness and is given a committed reading here... a foot-tapping conclusion to the disc, with a dreamy 'Summertime', and Joo Yeon Sir finally lets her hair down in 'It ain't necessarily so'."

    Gramophone, Mark Pullinger, September 2017

  • "Britten, a reading that fairly brims with gutsy temperament... Highlight elsewhere include a delectably sultry and winningly affectionate rendering of Fallas' immensely personable Suite, as well as a Milhaud with high jinks, caprice and nostalgia in abundance... considerable emotional and stylistic challenges she surmounts with swaggering confidence and engaging flair. Enviably poised, silvery of tone and scrupulously attentive, she forms a real, breathing partnership with the admirable Irina Andrievsky... On the plentiful evidence served up here, Joo Yeon Sir is truly a class act."

    ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Classical Ear, Andrew Achenbach, July 2017

  • "The robust central core of the recital is Britten's Suite for violin and piano. Sir's performance points up the work's dry, alert qualities and she creates an air of hushed mystery in the central Moto perpetuo... Sir ends on a high with Le boeuf sur le toit, replete with Latin American flavour and an often breathtaking command of Honegger's wild cadenza. The sound balance, too, is most impressive here."

    The Strad, Edward Bhesania, September 2017

PERFORMANCES

  • "Ysaye's Poeme élégiaque received a glowing performance, with Sir beautifully shaping its long sinuous lines and producing fine G-string playing in the funeral march. She was exuberant in Darius Milhaud's 'cinema-fantasie' Le boeuf sur le toit, feline and seductive, rattling off the fiendish cadenza (by Honegger, I think) with bravura and oodles of personality. It's a technical roast, often in several keys at once, brilliantly delivered."

    The Strad, Tim Homfray, Wigmore Hall 11 November 2013