“….the wonderful music on this CD… above all the opening work, Glyph (from 1984), which means a kind of carving.This work consists of beautiful, sweeping, imaginative music in four movements titled Luminous, Flickering, Ecstatic and Incandescent. The delicate piano performance of Margaret Kampmeier; James Dunham, with his viola, which is all song and virtuosity without showing off, and the French (sic) Cassatt Quartet, which can proudly stand beside the famed Kronos Quartet that commissioned Elijah’s Chariot and premiered it. This tonal, romantic music shows how little style is the measure of good music, and how one can write romantic music and be at the same time contemporary. True, this is not likely, but it is nevertheless possible – and rare as it may be, here the possible comes into being….”
Ha’Aretz
April 11, 2014
“Just the Adagio from the (Viola) sonata of Shostakovich was worth the whole Festival, thanks to the impressive version offered by Dunham, from the beauty of the sound to the intense expression.”
– Andrés Moreno Mengibar
Diario de Sevilla
September 2009
“The rich, loamy sound of violist James Dunham…improved the balance between piano and strings in Mendelssohn’s Third Piano Quartet, Op. 3.”
– Charles T. Downey onTrio con Brio Copenhagen
performed at the Library of Congress, Washington Post
February 19, 2009
“(James) Dunham rose to the challenge, reveling in the rich sound of the viola (both round and focused, with a golden timbre). He took the lead where necessary, as though he had been a longtime member (of the Axelrod Quartet).”
– Ronni Reich, Washington Post
January 28, 2008
“Violist James Dunham’s warm-toned contributions were…oasis of beauty.”
– Scott Cantrell, Dallas Morning News
October 1, 2007
“The sound of (James Dunham’s) Gasparo da Salo instrument was the aural equivalent of a rare VSOP cognac…”
– Dennis Rooney, The Strad
April 2005