Anastasia Kobekina - Press Reviews

World premiere: Thierry Escaich Symphonic poem

Throughout, Kobekina commanded the full range of her instrument, from its lowest registers to its highest, through ferocious double stops and long stretches of intricate figuration that wove in and out of the orchestral texture as if thinking aloud. The variety of character she brought to it all was extraordinary: lyrical, virtuosic, confiding, searching. What made her performance all the more remarkable was the contrast with the world most young soloists inhabit – years of competition preparation, concertos woodshedded in isolation long before any professional orchestra enters the picture. Here she was inside the creative process from the start, the work written for her. It showed.

Laurence Vittes, Seen and Heard International, 5 June 2026

Over the course of a diptych, Kobekina moves from a lyrical cello, then a virtuoso display on its double stops, to a tone of intimacy, until finally fading into silence. The composer, for his part, completes in about twenty minutes a concertante piece with an evocative program, avoiding any hint of emphasis, demonstrating his mastery of texture, color, and orchestration.

Benoît Fauchet, Diapason, 3 June 2026