Sunday 11 April 11.30am at the National Museum Cardiff
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-91)
String Quartet in B flat, K.458
1 Allegro vivace assai
2 Menuetto and Trio
3 Adagio
4 Allegro assai
Mozart did not grasp the full potential of the string quartet as a medium until he encountered Haydn's recently finished set of so-called "Russian" Quartets, Op.33, sometime around 1781. Indeed, it was with the "Russian" Quartets that Haydn had for the first time brought the classical string quartet to its highest technical and expressive peak. He had, of course already composed the masterly Op.17 and 20 Quartets, but the "Russian" Quartets were composed in what he described as "an entirely new and special manner." In them all the four instruments take part as equals and no longer is the quartet dominated by the first violin alone. Instead the string quartet became a subtle interaction of four different voices sharing and developing a discourse between them.
Although Mozart had previously written quartets, it was after studying these Haydn Quartets that he embarked on a new series of six Quartets of his own. The result were the six so-called "Haydn" Quartets K.387, 421, 428, 458, 464 and 465 in which Mozart, whilst learning from Haydn, created six innovatory works in his own style. The process was slow and the Quartets occupied him from 1782 through to 1785. Haydn himself heard the last three of the Quartets played during a visit to Vienna in February 1785 and wrote to Mozart's father, Leopold: "I tell you before God as an honest man, your son is the greatest among the composers known to me by name and person: he has good taste, and furthermore the greatest knowledge of composition." A few months later on 1 September, Mozart sent manuscript copies of the six Quartets to Haydn with a dedicatory letter in which he asked him to "receive them kindly and to them be a father, guide and friend."
Haydn could, as a master and innovator within the medium himself, instantly grasp the innovations and subtleties of Mozart's new Quartets. Others though experienced difficulties with their new and complex language. Thomas Attwood sent Paisiello copies of the Quartets with the warning that he should hear them several times before making a judgement whilst Mozart's friend Sarti declared them to be filled with "barbarisms" that would make the "listener stop his ears."
The Quartet in B flat, K.458 is the fourth of the set and was completed in Vienna on 9 November 1784. Of it, and the other two later works in the set, Leopold Mozart remarked, "they are lighter, but at the same time excellent compositions." Einstein summed the matter up with the conclusion that "their art more concealed, their gaiety seems more innocent." The Quartet is the most relaxed of the six and is in four movements: its name, the "Hunt", is derived from the hunting-inspired theme that opens the first movement. This movement is amongst the most unorthodox of the set with no secondary theme as such and a central development that only distantly draws on what has gone before. The second movement is stiff and formal Minuet relieved by a fleet of foot central trio; the rich and deeply felt slow third movement is the only true Adagio of the six quartets. The concluding movement returns to the lighter vein of the first combining what Cobbett terms "Mozartian roguishness and Haydnesque humour."
Recommended Recording:
Guarneri Quartet. RCA Red Seal 82876 60390 2 (part of a complete set of all the Mozart “Haydn” Quartets at budget price)
Claude Debussy (1862-1918)
String Quartet in G minor, Op.10
1 Animé et très décidé
2 Assez vif et bien rythmé
3 Andantino, doucement expressif
4 Très modéré
Debussy's one and only string quartet is something of a curiosity. In its use of the classical title of string quartet, it departs from Debussy's previous, and later literary and pictorial allegiances into what, on the surface, seems to be a more academic world. In addition the title also includes the work's key and even an opus number - the only opus number in the whole of his output. Its title though disguises the Quartet's radical and innovatory character. It was first heard in Paris in December 1893, given by the Ysaÿe Quartet, and puzzled Debussy's contemporaries: never before had the medium of the string quartet sounded so novel, rich and free.
The Quartet is in four movements, linked by a single theme that undergoes constant transformation. A first movement (Animé et très décidé), flowing naturally from one idea and seemingly the product its own passion, sets the music apart from previous quartets. The second movement (Assez vif et bien rythmé) startled early listeners with its combination of bowed and plucked strings, novel textures, rhythmic innovations and an almost orchestral treatment of the music. The inward melancholy of the slow third movement (Andantino, doucement expressif) is at the heart of the work, whilst the finale (Très modéré) draws the threads of the preceding movements together with both vigour and passion.
Recommended Recording:
Melos Quartet. Deutsche Grammophon 463 082-2 (with the Ravel Quartet)
© Peter Reynolds
The Finzi Quartet was formed under the guidance of the late Dr Christopher Rowland at the Royal Northern College of Music. Recently selected by the Tillett Trust and the Park Lane Group, 2009/2010 sees the Quartet’s debut at both the Wigmore Hall and the Purcell Room in London.
Winner of 2nd Prize in the 2009 Trondheim International String Quartet Competition in Norway, the Quartet is also a laureate of the 31st London International String Quartet Competition and was a finalist in the Gianni Bergamo Classic Music Award for Chamber Music in Switzerland. In 2008 the Quartet was invited to take part in the Tunnell Trust’s Blair Atholl Showcase in Scotland, to which it returned early last year, and recently undertook a two-week Residency in Aldeburgh following visits to the Britten-Pears International Academy of String Quartets in 2006 and 2008. It has given numerous recitals for music societies throughout the United Kingdom, the Schubert Institute, the Bridgewater Hall’s ‘Lite Bites’ Series, and at St James’s Church Piccadilly in London, and recently took part in a collaboration with the Medici Quartet in the premiere of ‘Towards Silence’ by Sir John Tavener in London and Winchester.
After working with Günter Pichler of the Alban Berg Quartet in Aldeburgh and Siena, Italy, the Quartet was invited to study in his 2008/2009 chamber music class at the Instituto Internacional de Música de Cámara de Madrid, where it attended on a monthly visiting basis. This was made possible by a full scholarship from the Albéniz Foundation in Madrid. The Quartet has benefited hugely from the support and mentorship of Günter Pichler and will make several visits to continue its work with him in Madrid in 2010. The Quartet has also participated in masterclasses with Alasdair Tait, Isabel Charisius, the Endellion Quartet, Valentin Erben, Gabor Takacs-Nagy, Hugh Maguire and Thomas Riebl, and in 2008 was selected for Andras Keller’s class at the International Musicians Seminar in Prussia Cove.
Having a strong desire to promote the music of English composers, the Quartet feels extremely honoured that the Finzi Trust supports their use of Gerald Finzi’s name.
Future projects include an Artsreach Residency in Dorset, the closing concert of an exciting new series at the Louise Blouin Institue in London and a concert for the Patrons of Lake District Summer Music in their New Generation Artists Series. The Quartet is also a recipient of last years’ Tunnell Trust Award and as a result undertook a concert tour of Scotland in November 2009. The Quartet is passionate about outreach work and has recently begun working with CAVATINA Chamber Music Trust giving concerts in schools around London.
Trinity College of Music has recently appointed the Finzi Quartet Bulldog Junior Fellows in String Quartet for 2009/2010.
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Sunday 7 March
Gabriel Fauré (1845-1924)
Piano Trio D minor, Op.120
1 Allegro ma non troppo
2 Andantino
3 Allegro vivo
Fauré wrote a handful of works that have attained huge popularity: the Pavane, Sicilienne from Pelléas et Mélisande, the Élégie and, above all, the Requiem. The intense, but understated lyricism of these pieces possibly offers a clue as to why, even now, much of Fauré's other music is not as well-known as it might be. There can be few major composers whose music is as private and personal, but also as deeply felt and civilized. Fauré exercised considerable charm over his contemporaries; "... very tanned of face, with dark eyes and hair, he had a dreamy, melancholy air, illuminated now and then by the youthful twinkle of a street-urchin. The sound of his voice was soft and deep."
It is a curious quirk of history that Fauré’s Piano Trio, his penultimate work, was written some ten years later than that by his pupil Ravel. Composed in 1922-23, it is one of a group of six chamber works from his last years (the others include the Second Violin Sonata and Quintet, the two Cello Sonatas and his final work, the String Quartet). By this time Fauré suffered from a particularly debilitating and cruel form of deafness, rendering all music that he could still hear in a profoundly distorted form. He had become increasingly weak and easily exhausted, yet his creative vigour outstripped his physical capabilities with a series of works that are the crowning glory of his output and amongst the most distinguished in the chamber repertoire. The suggestion that he should write the Trio seems to have come from his publisher, Jacques Durand, and Fauré started it during his stay at Annecy-le-Vieux in the summer of 1922, finishing it in Paris by the spring of 1923. Its first performance was given at the Société Nationale, Paris, on 12 May 1923 by Tatiana de Sansévitch, Robert Krettly and Jacques Pathé.
Lasting only a little over twenty minutes, the Trio is cast in three movements. The first (Allegro non troppo), opens with a long singing leisurely theme for the cello, and has been described by the Fauré scholar, Robert Orledge, as “a slow controlled climb from a limpid start to the incandescent coda.” The second slow movement (Andantino), the heart of the work, was the first to be composed and was written in the surroundings of Annecy-le-Vieux. The composer Charles Koechlin, writing just after Fauré’s death, describes the surroundings in which it was written as, “on the heights … overlooking the mountains, almost Italian in its light and contours, fringing the blue waters of the lake … the sun illuminating with soft light the tranquil summits silhouetted against the sky.” The finale (Allegro vivo), by comparison, is full of graceful energy and lightness, with touches suggesting that some of its material might originally have originated as a scherzo.
Recommended Recording:
Kathryn Stott, Priya Mitchell & Christian Poltéra. Chandos CHAN 10447 (with the two Cello Sonatas and Thirteenth Nocturne)
Maurice Ravel (1875-1937)
Piano Trio in A minor
1 Modéré
2 Pantoum : Assez vif
3 Trés large : Passacaille
4 Animé
Ravel’s Piano Trio shows a return to the classical discipline and sparer textures of chamber music after a period where he had composed the extravagant ballet Daphnis et Chloé (1912) and the fantastical textures of the Trois Poèms de Stéphane Mallarmé (1913). Ravel had intended to write a trio since about 1908 and something of his concern that it should reflect the traditional values of line over colour and harmony is acknowledged in its dedication to his old counterpoint teacher, André Gédalge. Work commenced on the Trio early in 1914 and the first movement was complete by the end of March. With the onset of the summer months, Ravel, as was his habit, took up residence at Saint-Jean-de-Luz in the Basses-Pyrénées. Writing to a friend towards the end of July, he reported that, “in spite of the fine weather, for the last three weeks the Trio has made no progress and I am disgusted with it.”
Within days events in far off Sarajevo were to change Europe forever and by early August war had broken out. Writing to his friend, Godebski the day after the declaration of war, Ravel declared, “I’m absolutely all in; this perpetual nightmare is too atrocious. I feel I shall go mad or yield to the obsession. You think I am no longer working? I have never worked so hard, so madly…” Indeed, by the 28 August Ravel was able to write to his publisher, Jacques Durand, that the Trio was complete. In a letter to Stravinsky, written later in September, he revealed that the possibility of joining the army forced him to do, “five months work in five weeks.” Nonetheless, he was deemed unfit for military service and only in March 1915 was he able to find a place as a truck driver. By that time, the Trio had received its first performance, given in Paris on 28 January 1915 by Georges Enesco, Feuillard and Alfredo Casella.
The Trio is in four movements. The first (Modéré) opens with a Basque-inflected theme; surely one of the most memorable Ravel ever conceived. Pure and withdrawn at first and moving fitfully in one-bar phrases, the idea gathers in passion and soon takes wing, leading to a secondary theme, fleeting in character. It may not be too fanciful to hear, in the still transience of the reappearance of the themes at the close of the movement, a ghostly premonition of events to come: of a world about to vanish forever.
The second movement (Pantoum : Assez vif) is a scherzo in all but name. The word, Pantoum, standing at the head of the score, indicates that Ravel wished to associate the movement’s rhythmic subtleties with those found in the Malayan pantun. Mercurial and waltz-like with an unassuming episode at its centre, it is the perfect foil for the slow third movement (Trés large : Passacaille): withdrawn and dark, leading to an impassioned climax. The Finale (Animé) is dazzling and energetic, making considerable demands on the performers’ virtuosity. It culminates in an affirmative yet curiously ambivalent close.
Recommended Recording:
Renaud & Gautier Capuçon & Frank Braley. Virgin 724354549229 (with the Ravel Sonata)
© Peter Reynolds
The Erato Trio
Formed at London’s Royal College of Music in 2005, the Erato Piano Trio is rapidly establishing a reputation as one of the UK’s leading young ensembles, praised for their virtuosity, outstanding musicianship and stylistic versatility alike. As first prize winners of the Anglo-Czech Trust Competition they currently pursue a busy schedule of recitals around the UK and the European mainland. Their repertoire extends from the classical works of Haydn, Hummel and Mozart over the romantic masterpieces to 20th century music by Schnittke, Avner Dorman and Mark-Anthony Turnage. Their interpretation of the Piano Trio by Alfred Schnittke was received enthusiastically by audiences and critics alike and led to an invitation by Professor Alexander Ivashkin, Schnittke’s close friend and biographer, to perform the work at the Centre for Russian Music in London.
Highlights of the past seasons have included performances at the Martinu Hall in Prague, the Shostakovich Celebration Concert at the Royal College of Music and most notably a hugely successful tour to Switzerland in 2007 as part of which they gave their much acclaimed debut at Zurich’s famous Tonhalle, performing Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time alongside the distinguished Spanish clarinettist Joan Enric Lluna. They were selected onto the Concordia Foundation Young Artists Scheme in 2008 and subsequently performed a series of recitals at prestigious London venues including St. Martin in the Fields.
Recent performances have included their Welsh debut at the National Museum and Gallery in Cardiff, appearances at the Lower Machen and Uckfield Festivals, a tour to Sardinia as well as recitals for numerous UK chamber music societies. Highlights of the upcoming season include their first trip to Asia for performances at the Shanghai International Arts Fair, their return to Cardiff in March 2010 as well as many weeks in the recording studio to record the entire collection of Haydn Piano Trios, the first disc of which will be released this autumn.
The three young musicians have benefited from the guidance of Salvatore Accardo, Professor John Barstow MBE, Leonid Gorokhov, Ani Schnarch and the Chilingirian Quartet. They were also selected to perform in masterclasses with Lewis Kaplan as well as with legendary cellist and Beaux Arts Trio founder Bernard Greenhouse.
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Sunday 7 February
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827)
The Three Sonatas, Op 2
Beethoven's thirty-two Sonatas for piano span the greater part of his career, ranging from the Op.2 set, composed in the mid-1790s, through to the magisterial final three Sonatas, completed in 1820-22, written concurrently with the Ninth Symphony and Missa Solemnis. After finishing them he decided that the piano was, "after all an unsatisfactory instrument". Indeed, at the time of the publication of Beethoven’s first three Sonatas, on 9 March 1796, the piano was, by modern standards, an unsatisfactory instrument; it had been in existence for less than 100 years and would have been tested to its limits by the physical onslaught imposed upon it by these bold works. In Beethoven’s hands the form of the piano sonata took on a new seriousness found only intermittently in the sonatas of Mozart and Haydn that preceded them, and became known as music’s New Testament (the Old Testament, of course, being Bach’s Well-tempered Clavier, or the ’48 Preludes and Fugues).
The Sonatas are dedicated to Haydn, with whom Beethoven had briefly studied in 1792 on taking up residence in Vienna. The lessons were not a success; Haydn found the young man a little too self-assured and Beethoven suspected the older man of wishing to suppress his work. That Beethoven learnt more from Haydn’s music than from the man himself is borne out in these three sonatas, which though shot through in every bar with the bold and impetuous character of the young man, are firmly grounded in the classical style. Haydn was present at the first private performance of the Sonatas, given by Beethoven at one of Prince Lichnowsky’s Friday concerts. Haydn had only just returned from London, where he had written his three great final piano sonatas in 1794, culminating in the great E flat Sonata, and must have been conscious of the form, already moving into new territory in his own hands, taking a further step forward in the hands of his younger colleague.
The three Op 2 Sonatas were completed by 1795, but had probably been begun much earlier. They were not, in fact, Beethoven’s first sonatas, but they were the first that he felt deserved the sanction of an opus number. Although much has been said of Haydn and Beethoven’s relationship to his music, these Sonatas probably owe far more to the example of Muzio Clementi in terms of the layout for the piano and keyboard figuration. Yet, as Barry Cooper has pointed out, Beethoven’s “themes tend to be more unusual and distinctive; his textures are richer and more complex; modulations are more frequent and daring; motivic development is more intensive; contrasts are sharper and more dramatic; and emotion, whether of exuberance tenderness or anguish, are much more strongly characterized.” The works had a considerable impact following publication, establishing Beethoven beyond doubt as the most significant young composer of his generation.
Sonata in F minor, Op 2, No 1
1 Allegro
2 Adagio
3 Menuetto: Allegretto
4 Prestissimo
The first of the three Op 2 Sonatas is perhaps the boldest and most immediately forceful of the set. Unlike the majority of Haydn or Mozart’s Sonatas, it is cast in four, rather than three, movements, with the addition of a minuet for the third movement (this is pattern is generally replicated throughout most of the early Sonatas). The explosive opening of the first movement (Allegro), both passionate and elegant, launches a taut drama of contrasts that does not let up for a moment. The second slow movement (Adagio), in the tonic major, is derived from an early Piano Quartet, and has a serenity that is only occasionally clouded, whilst the third movement (Menuetto: Allegretto) has an underlying tension which explodes in the stormy finale (Prestissimo).
Sonata in A, Op 2, No 2
1 Allegro vivace
2 Largo appassionato
3 Allegretto
4 Grazioso
The second sonata of the set is the most spacious of the three Op 2 Sonatas and is again cast in four movements. The first (Allegro vivace) opens with a quiet abrupt idea that flowers into a series of ideas spreading, like so many branches on a tree, the music overflowing with invention and incident. The slow movement (Largo appassionato) is a long-breathed aria over a walking bass and the heart of the work. The third movement (Allegretto) is a scherzo in all but name, set in motion by a fleet figuration of gossamer lightness, whilst the finale (Grazioso) is relaxed in nature leading to a poetic and peaceful close.
Sonata in C, Op 2, No 3
1 Allegro con brio
2 Adagio
3 Allegro
4 Assai allegro
The final sonata of the set is thought to have been written last, just prior to publication, and is genial and playful in character, as befits its key. The first of its four movements (Allegro con brio) opens with a quiet economical idea (not unlike the later Op 22 Sonata), opening out into a relaxed long-limbed movement full of glittering invention. The second movement (Adagio) is in the remote key of E major (a daring choice at this date) and has a grave beauty, far removed from the brilliance of the movements surrounding it. The third movement (Allegro) opens with an idea of great brilliance in four imitative voices, eventually evaporating in the bass of the piano. The finale opens with a brilliant flourish in ascending 6/3 chords whose sense of elegant fun never lets up all the way through to its energetic conclusion.
Recommended Recording
Murray Perahia. Sony SK 64397 (a single disc with all three sonatas).
There is also a disc by Alfred Brendel on Philips 442 124-2
Historical Recording
Artur Schnabel. Naxos 8.110693. Schnabel was the first pianist to record all Beethoven’s Sonatas in the 1930s. This is one of the towering classic recordings of all time.
© Peter Reynolds
Llŷr Williams
“…one of the truly great musicians of our time. … Those with ears to hear will have followed Williams’s playing as it has grown ever more secure and expansive. The hallmark of his Schumann Fantasy was its rare ability to take us deep into a very private world of dream, while at the same time creating a generously projected and truly virtuoso performance.” The Times, April 2007
The young Welsh pianist, Llŷr Williams, brings an extraordinary musical intelligence to all his work, as soloist, accompanist and chamber musician. He has performed with such orchestras as the BBC Symphony Orchestra, BBC National Orchestra of Wales (with whom he successfully toured the USA), Sinfonia Cymru, London Mozart Players, Hallé Orchestra and the Minnesota Orchestra. He has performed at the BBC Proms in London and has given many remarkable performances at the Edinburgh Festival.
He has recently undertaken a busy mix of recitals, concerti, accompaniment and chamber music. Williams has toured in Europe with Mitsuko Uchida, Christian Poltéra, Soovin Kim and Martin Fröst, as part of the Borletti-Buitoni Trust's celebration of its fifth anniversary, with venues including the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam and the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London. At the beginning of 2009 he gave a series of four concerts for BBC Radio 3 in Cardiff, to celebrate the opening of BBC Hoddinott Hall. He also worked with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, made a welcome return to I Pomeriggi Musicali in Milan to work with Antonello Manacorda and Alexander Janiczek, performing Berg's Chamber Concerto and Mendelssohn's Double Concerto. Williams also made his recital débuts at the Lucerne Festival, in the Wigmore Hall's main recital series and at Carnegie Hall. In the summer of 2009, he was one of the official accompanists for the Cardiff Singer of the World Competition.
In 2005 Llŷr Williams was awarded the MIDEM Classique ‘Outstanding Young Artist Award’ in partnership with the International Artist Managers’ Association. His first commercial CD featuring Chopin’s Préludes was released in March 2006 on the Quartz label. He is also the subject of a film - Y Pianydd – Llŷr Williams - by Opus TF for S4C (the Welsh language broadcaster) which recently won a Welsh BAFTA for Best Music Programme. The programme also won an award at the Celtic Media Festival, held on the Isle of Skye, for Best Entertainment Programme.
Born in 1976 in Pentrebychan, North Wales, Llŷr Williams read music at The Queen’s College, Oxford, graduating in 1998 with a first class alpha degree. He went on to take up a postgraduate scholarship at the Royal Academy of Music where he won every prize and award. From 2000-02 he was a ‘Shinn’ Fellow at the Academy, coaching singers and studying conducting. He was also an active member of the Live Music Now! scheme for several years. In 2002, Llŷr Williams was selected for the Young Concert Artists Trust scheme and received a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award in 2004.
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Sunday 17 January
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827)
String Quartet in A, Op 18, No 5
1 Allegro
2 Menuetto
3 Andante cantabile
4 Allegro
The six string quartets comprising Beethoven’s Op.18 were his first attempt at a genre that, in his hands, would change out of all recognition in the first quarter of the nineteenth century. All six quartets are firmly rooted in the formal style brought to perfection by Haydn and, indeed, are contemporaneous with Haydn’s own late Op.76 and 77 sets. We know little about their genesis, except that they were begun in the summer of 1798 and were published in 1801, the first three in the early summer and the remainder in the autumn.
The young Beethoven regarded the symphony and string quartet as the most noble and elevated forms of instrumental music and approached his first essays in this medium with a much care. Along with his First Symphony of 1800, Beethoven saw his first set of quartets as a grand, public display of his compositional craft. In preparing the set of six he undertook contrapuntal exercises and probably tried over some of the works in private at the house of Professor Förster, working through their intricacies with the leading string players of the day.
The six quartets were commissioned by and dedicated to Prince Lobkowitz (1772-1816), one of Beethoven’s most enthusiastic admirers to whom the later Eroica Symphony was also dedicated. The fifth of the Op 18 quartets, the fourth to be composed, was mainly set down in 1799 and was clearly modelled on Mozart’s A major Quartet, K.464 (a transcript of it in Beethoven’s own hand exists). It is the most classically conventional of the six, though this in no way should be seen as being to its detriment; in the context of the series of six highly contrasted, and at times experimental, works, its effortless classical mastery is an important counterbalance to the remainder of the series.
The Quartet is in the usual four movements. The first (Allegro) is of disarming elegance and transparency and, unusually for the period, is followed by a minuet and waltz-like trio as the second, rather than the third, movement. The slow third movement (Andante cantabile) undoubtedly forms the heart of the work and is a theme with five variations (the fifth is particularly remarkable) leading to an extended coda. The finale (Allegro) has a soufflé lightness of touch and effortless smoothness that is the perfect counterbalance to what has gone before. Its conclusion, where the cello has the last word, followed by the piano final chord, has a Haydn-like deftness about it.
Recommended Recording
Quartetto Italiano. Philips 426 046-2PM (part of the 2-CD set of all six Op 18 Quartets)
Johannes Brahms (1833-97)
String Quartet in C minor, Op 51, No 1
1 Allegro
2 Romanze, poco adagio
3 Allegretto molto moderato e comodo
4 Allegro
Brahms waited until the age of forty to publish his first two string quartets. Like Beethoven before him he regarded the symphony and string quartet as the most elevated of musical forms and it was only after many years of thought and revision that he felt able to put his essays in these forms before the public. Brahms claimed, apocryphally maybe, that he had written twenty or so quartets that were destroyed before arriving at what we know today as his First Quartet, the present work in C minor. Like the great classical composers before him, he made his debut as a composer of quartets by publishing a set of them, though not six, as in the case of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, but two. Yet for all their compositional mastery, Brahms never seems to have been wholly at home in the world of the string quartet. The two Op.51 works are earnest and generally severe in character and he only returned to the genre once again, with the magnificent B flat Quartet, Op.67.
It seems likely that the two Op.51 Quartets were already well advanced in their composition by the late 1860s and in mid-1869 we find Brahms writing to his publisher, Simrock, to let him know that he was rehearsing some quartets in order to “make one or the other passable” for publication. The two quartets were eventually completed, for the second time (as Brahms noted) in the summer months of 1873 and it was only after further revision, following a private performance, that they reached publication. They are dedicated to Brahms’s friend, the surgeon and keen chamber music player, Theodor Billroth, to whom the Second Symphony is also dedicated.
The key of the First Quartet, C minor, is significant. Ever since Mozart’s C minor Piano Concerto (K.491), this key was invested with much symbolism within the Viennese tradition. In the hands of Mozart it is dark and tempestuous, whilst in Beethoven’s works, from the Pathétique Sonata through the Fifth Symphony to the final Piano Sonata, Op.111, it symbolises heroic conflict. In Brahms’s music it is more directly tragic and was felt to be significant enough to become the key of both his First Quartet and First Symphony.
The Quartet is in four movements, though in the manner of Brahms’s symphonies and many other works, he replaces the third movement scherzo with a gentler intermezzo-type movement. The first movement (Allegro) throws the listener immediately into the tragic strum und drang that lies at the heart of this work, with music full of “fevered rhetoric and strenuous energy” (Malcolm MacDonald). Yet this is not simply a throwback to an earlier classical model; Schoenberg later admired it for its far reaching a progressive use of tonality and for the severity with which the initial rising motif, given out by the first violin in the opening two bars, permeates virtually everything that follows in this and the ensuing three movements.
The second movement (Romanze, poco adagio) eschews the profundity of the Beethovenian adagio in favour of a “song-like character with a nocturnal melancholy”, whilst the third movement (Allegretto molto moderato e comodo) has a strange twilight quality, whose reverie is only broken by the urgent drama of the work’s finale (Allegro)
Recommended Recording:
Alban Berg String Quartet. EMI CDS7 54829-2 (part of a complete set of the string quartets)
© Peter Reynolds
The Barbirolli Quartet is known for its diverse, prolific repertoire and dynamic approach to performance. The Times recently described them as “forthright, full-blooded musicians, afraid of nothing” and The Strad hailed their “superbly realised performance” and “precision of ensemble at formidable rates of energy”.
In 2008, The Barbirolli Quartet’s achievements included winning a Tunnell Trust Award, being chosen for the Countess of Munster Musical Trust Recital Scheme and, most prestigiously, their selection by the European Concert Halls Organisation (ECHO) for inclusion in the 'Rising Stars' series.
Following their nomination by the UK members of ECHO, this tour of Europe’s leading concert halls in 2010 will take them to cities such as Paris, Amsterdam, Cologne, Barcelona, Athens, Stockholm and Salzburg, having opened Birmingham Town Hall’s own Rising Stars Series in October 2009.
Engagements in 08/09 included Wigmore Hall, St. David's Hall Cardiff, Harrogate International Festival, Edinburgh International Fringe Festival, Manchester Mid-Day in Bridgewater Hall, St James's Piccadilly and St John’s, Smith Square. Following their highly successful appearance at the Cheltenham Festival in 2008, they returned in the summer of 2009 in collaboration with the Australian String Quartet, and gave a series of recitals at Lichfield, Buxton and Ryedale Festivals. They also taught and performed at the Dartington International Summer School and appeared in the ROSL Edinburgh Festival Fringe.
In November 2009, the quartet travelled to New Zealand where they joined the panel of adjudicators for the Pettman/ROSL Arts International Scholarship, and toured Singapore, NZ and Australia. In May 2010 they make a further return to the Wigmore Hall, following their recent selection by the Kirckman Concert Society.
The Barbirolli Quartet collaborate with eminent pianists in an ongoing cycle of Piano Quintets, covering the major works of Dvorak, Brahms, Schumann and Elgar and they have also been joined by David Campbell and Timothy Orpen for performances of Mozart's Clarinet Quintet. The quartet has a keen interest in performing new music and in January 2008 made their Purcell Room debut as Park Lane Group Artists to critical acclaim. They regularly work in conjunction with new composers and recent premieres include 'Folk Music' by Joe Cutler and ‘From listening to trees’ by Emily Hall.
Formed in 2003 at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, the Barbirolli Quartet brings together a wealth of experience, its founding members each having performed widely in their native countries of Canada, Wales and Australia before coming to England to continue their studies. They are now based in London. The quartet has worked with Walter Levin and Louis Fima as part of the ProQuartet-CEMC professional training program and in 2008 was awarded Artists Fellowships at London’s Guildhall School of Music, studying primarily with The Belcea Quartet.
The Barbirolli Quartet are very grateful to the Richard Carne Trust for its generous support and also to the University of Salford, where they give regular performances in the Tuesday Midday Recitals at Peel Hall as the university's 'Quartet in Residence'.
Rakhi Singh (violin) is based in London and performs regularly with St. Martins-in-the-Fields, Ensemble Moderne and the Fine Arts Ensemble of Wales. Over the past year she has performed the Sibelius, Prokofiev and Kurt Weill concertos with orchestras in the UK and toured Italy with the Orchestra of the Toscanini Foundation performing the Beethoven concerto. Recent projects included a collaboration with Diversions (Wales' National Dance Company) performing movements from Bach's D minor partita. She is the Winner of the Bryn Terfel Scholarship and the Prince of Wales Award 2008.
Katie Stillman (violin) was chosen for the Tillett Trust’s Young Artists’ Platform in 2005 and in 2006 was awarded the Maisie Lewis Award from the Worshipful Company of Musicians. She was prize-winner at the International Stepping Stones Competition the same year. Engagements have included a lunchtime recital for the Manchester Mid-day series at Bridgewater Hall, her Purcell Room debut as part of the Park Lane Group "Young Artists" New Year Series 2007, a concerto performance with the London Mozart Players and recitals at St. John’s Smith Square, St. James's Piccadilly, St George’s Bristol and Wigmore Hall.
Ella Brinch (viola) has received numerous awards and scholarships both in Australia and England. She has performed with many orchestras including the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Academy of St Martin in the Fields and the Philharmonia. Ella has been in high demand as a chamber musician appearing in various ensembles with artists such as Sakari Oramo, Alina Pogostkina and Peter Donohoe.
Ashok Klouda (cello) was winner of the 2006 J. & A. Beare Solo Bach Competition and the 2007 Royal College of Music Cello Competition, and makes his solo Wigmore Hall debut in 09-10, having won the Worshipful Company of Musicians/Concordia Foundation Young Artists Fund competition. Ashok has studied under some of the world’s finest teachers including Colin Carr, Jérôme Pernoo and Louise Hopkins at the Royal Academy of Music, Royal College of Music and Hochschule der Künste Bern. Whilst a member of the Artea Quartet, Ashok performed in the Wigmore Hall, on BBC Radio 3, in the BBC Proms and at many concert venues throughout the country.
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Sunday December 13th
Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)
String Quartet in E flat, Op.33, No.2 (Joke)
1 Allegro moderato, cantabile
2 Scherzo, Allegro
3 Largo sostenuto
4 Finale. Presto
The composition of the six Op.20 String Quartets was one of the great achievements of Haydn's early career. In the nine years that followed however no further quartets came from Haydn's pen. This was due to nothing less than the construction of a 400-seat opera house in the grounds of Esterháza (the estate at which Haydn was music director) obliging him to both conduct a substantial number of operatic performances as well as composing his own operas. Not surprisingly, this enterprise diverted him from the composition of further string quartets and it was not until 1781 that he was to return to the medium.
In the autumn of that year he announced the publication of a new set of six quartets, composed in what he described as, "an entirely new and special manner." Dedicated to the Russian Grand Duke Paul, the Op.33 Quartets are often referred to as the "Russian" Quartets. In them Haydn brought the classical string quartet to its highest technical and expressive peak. All the four instruments take part as equals and no longer does the first violin alone dominate. The string quartet becomes a subtle interaction of four different voices sharing and developing a discourse between them.
The present quartet, the second one of the set, strongly contrasts the inward first and third movements with the more frankly extrovert second and fourth movements. The first movement (Allegro moderato, cantabile), in common with the other quartets of Op.33, is full of effortless mastery, particularly in the case of the deceptively simple opening theme that dominates the movement, constantly revealing itself in fresh lights and shadows. The second movement (Scherzo, Allegro), like the other Op.33 Quartets, innovates in its substitution of the usual minuet and trio with a fast scherzo, thus anticipating Beethoven. The austerely meditative third movement (Largo sostenuto) opens with a duet between the viola and cello alone. Its inwardness is later disturbed by an episode commencing with four loud explosive chords though the music does return to the initial mood before its exquisite dying close. It is from the finale (Presto) that the Quartet derives its nickname, the Joke, on account of the return of the main theme with longer and longer pauses between each of its phrases, tricking the listener into thinking that the work has ended.
Recommended Recording:
Lindsay Quartet. ASV CDDCA 937 (with Op.33, Nos. 1 & 4)
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827)
String Quartet in E flat, Op. 127
1 Maestoso - Allegro
2 Adagio, ma non troppo e molto cantabile
3 Scherzando vivace
4 Finale
By the summer of 1824, when Beethoven commenced work on his E flat Quartet, his deafness was total, his isolation irretrievable and the completeness of personal relations impossible. His Ninth Symphony and the Missa Solemnis had recently received their first performances and he had finally bid farewell to the piano with the Diabelli Variations, concluding that it was, “after all, an unsatisfactory instrument.” In November 1822, Beethoven had received two commissions: one from London for the Ninth Symphony (Choral) and the other, from Prince Galitzin of St Petersburg, for three string quartets. With the Ninth now behind him Beethoven returned, after twelve years, to the most exacting of all mediums, the string quartet, crowning his career with six works of supreme innovation, spiritual depth and profundity. Musical society was baffled by this music and the Quartets did not achieve completely satisfactory performances until those given by the Joachim Quartet fifty years later.
Along with the final Quartet of the series, that in F, Op.135, the E flat is, on the surface at least, one of the most conventional of these quartets, being cast in the usual four movements although, at some forty minutes in length, is considerably longer than was the norm. The new and unusual nature of the quartet meant that Beethoven took longer than usual to compose it. It was not completed until early in 1825 and first performed on 6 March by the Schuppanzigh Quartet. The audience were bewildered and, although he could not hear a note of the performance, Beethoven was dissatisfied, having followed intently with his eyes.
The first movement (Maestoso – Allegro) commences with an arresting slow six-bar introduction, which returns twice through the movement, before launching into a flowing main theme. Throughout, the music is of the utmost concentration, with abrupt changes of mood and independence of part-writing, never before encountered in a string quartet. The slow second movement (in A flat), lasting almost as long as a whole early Haydn Quartet, is the still centre of the work (Adagio, ma non troppo e molto cantabile). In the theme given out at the opening, time itself seems almost suspended, and the rapt mood is sustained through a series of five variations. A scherzo follows (Scherzando vivace), jerky and rough-hewn, re-establishing a more earthy vision after the inwardness of the second movement. At its centre is a whirling smoothly flowing theme, contrasted with a dance-like melody. The finale opens with a four-bar unison introduction, giving way to a good-humoured Haydn-like theme, weaving its way forward to a vigorous secondary theme. But the music’s simplicity is deceptive and, towards the close, a magical change of key (C major) presages a move into a new world of gossamer fluttering textures and a magical transformation of the theme that opened the movement, before two brusque chords bring us back to earth and the work to a close.
Recommended Recording:
Busch Quartet (r.1936). EMI 5 09656 (Budget priced set of all the late Quartets in superb new transfers of this classic recording)
© Peter Reynolds
The Solstice String Quartet were first prize-winners in the 2009 Royal Over-seas League Competition and are quickly gaining a reputation as one of the most talented young quartets in the country. Selected by both the Tillett Trust and Park Lane Group in 2008 the quartet made their debuts at the Wigmore Hall and Purcell Room in 2009. Established whilst studying at the Cambridge University in 2003, they held a Junior Fellowship at the Instituto Internacional de Música de Cámara de Madrid in 2008-9 where they studied every month with Prof. Günter Pichler of the Alban Berg Quartet. They have been awarded the Leverhulme Chamber Music Fellowship at the Royal Academy of Music from September 2009.
The quartet has performed throughout the UK and internationally, performing at major music festivals such as Dartington, Vale of Glamorgan Festival, Canterbury 'Sounds New' Festival and Aberystwyth, and has performed live on BBC Radio 3. Other notable performances include Barber's Dover Beach with baritone Steven Varcoe, and Mendelssohn's Octet with the Szymanowski Quartet and with the Sacconi Quartet; the quartet also enjoys ongoing collaboration with distinguished clarinettist David Campbell, with whom they have performed quintets by Brahms, Mozart and Bliss, and with pianist Tom Poster with whom they recently performed the Schumann piano quintet. Plans for the 2009-10 season include a return to the Wigmore Hall and performances at LSO St. Luke’s, a performance of the Schubert Quintet with Steven Isserlis, a debut at the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester, the premiere of Giles Swayne’s Fourth Quartet at the Cambridge Music Festival, and their debut at Musée d'Orsay in Paris.
Alongside a passion for the classical quartet cannon, interest in new music is a motivating factor for the quartet; it has given performances of music by prominent contemporary composers including Joe Cutler, Brett Dean, John Tavener, John Metcalf and Giles Swayne. The quartet recently gave the premiere of a major new work by Joseph Phibbs for quartet and soprano, and in August 2009 they premiered a new work by Graham Ross which they commissioned. Looking further ahead the quartet plan to premiere Giles Swayne's Fourth Quartet in November 2009, and to make a recording of his complete works for string quartet. Additionally, they plan to perform a work by cellist Gregor Riddell, who is also a composer. This is combined with educational work; the quartet has coached players at the Benslow Music Centre, at Wells Cathedral School and on the 'Da Capo' Course at ProCorda. From September 2009 they will coach chamber music at King's College, London.
The Solstice String Quartet has been fortunate to have enjoyed coaching from many eminent musicians; and have been particularly fortunate to have worked with members of the Alban Berg Quartet, and Hugh Maguire. Alongside a close association with the Britten-Pears Young Artists' Programme they have recently attended the Juilliard String Quartet Seminar in New York, where they studied with the Juilliard String Quartet. In 2009-10 they will attend regular masterclasses at the ProQuartet Foundation in Paris. The quartet are grateful to the Hattori Foundation and the Musicians' Benevolent Fund for their support.
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Sunday 15 November
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827)
Variations on "See the conqu'ring hero" from Judas Maccabaeus. WoO 45
Beethoven's Variations on Handel's See the conqu'ring hero (from his oratorio of 1747, Judas Maccabaeus) is a product of the composer's youth. As a young man Beethoven's music was regarded as bold, but it was as a pianist rather than as a composer that he made his strongest initial impression in his adopted city of Vienna. By the 1790s the period of the travelling virtuoso was burgeoning and, having conquered Vienna, Beethoven set out on his first tour, early in 1796, travelling to Prague, Dresden and Leipzig, finally arriving in Berlin where he played before the King of Prussia, Friedrich Wilhelm II. The King was a great lover of music and a fine amateur cellist and, whilst in Berlin, Beethoven set about writing two sonatas for cello and piano and may have also written the present set of variations on Handel's theme. Both these Variations and the Sonatas were remarkable in their time for the way in which both the piano and cello played as equal partners. Earlier composers had put the cello in a subservient role, but here it has a soloistic role next to an equally elaborate piano part.
Beethoven was introduced to Handel's music by Haydn and soon became a devotee, holding Handel in higher esteem than any other composer. Whilst in Berlin he was able to hear a performance of Handel's oratorio Judas Maccabaeus, so it is easy to see why he should have picked its most popular air as the basis for a set of Variations. They would have been performed by the Prussian court cellist Jean-Louis Duport and Beethoven himself. The work consists of Handel's theme, followed by twelve variations.
Robert Schumann (1810-56)
Fantasiestücke, Op. 73
1 Zart und mit Ausdruck
2 Lebhaft, leicht
3 Rasch und mit Feuer
Irresponsible, inspired, enthusiastic and feverish, Robert Schumann had all the attributes of the popular conception of the romantic artist. His music gave the impression of having been, and indeed often was, written down in the heat of pure inspiration, his mind overflowing with ideas that were fastened down on paper almost as quickly as they occurred to him: "I have been all the week at the piano, composing, writing, laughing and crying all at once". It was inevitable that the highs of such creativity would also result in low barren periods. One of the worst of these occurred in the year 1846 and, only gradually during 1847 did Schumann’s creativity return. By the end of the year though he was now in a full flood of composition.
The Fantasiestücke (originally for clarinet and piano) was completed early in 1849 during a frenzied period of creative activity. The impetus for the work may have come from Schumann’s realisation, during the late 1840s, that his wind writing was often not as idiomatic as it might be. He resolved to write works for several solo wind instruments in order to hone his skills in this area. The resultant works included the oboe Romances (Op.94), Adagio and Allegro for horn (Op.70) and the present the Phantasiestücke (Op.73). Although the work is wonderfully conceived for the clarinet, it is often heard in this version for cello. Lasting around nine minutes, the three movements are thematically linked: first, a tender and lyrical song; second, a moving and light-hearted duet; and last, a passionately fiery conclusion.
Recommended Recording:
Mischa Maisky and Martha Argerich. Deutsch Gramophon 437 514-2
Johannes Brahms (1833-97)
Cello Sonata No.1 in E minor, Op.38
1 Allegro non troppo
2 Allegretto quasi menuetto
3 Allegro
In the summer of 1862, Brahms visited the Lower Rhine Music Festival in Cologne before taking a vacation with the conductor and composer Albert Dietrich and Clara Schumann, Robert Schumann’s widow. Brahms and Dietrich spent the days hiking and composing and in the evenings, Clara would play the piano. The music on which Brahms worked during his vacation was the First Cello Sonata and, in later years, his summer holidays were often to be his preferred period for composition. Nonetheless the Sonata was to take some years to reach its final form. It was finally completed in June 1865 (when its finale was written) for the amateur cellist Josef Gansbacher, but was not heard publicly until 14 January 1871 when it was given by cellist Emil Hegar and pianist (and Concertmaster of the Gewandhaus Orchestra) Carl Reinecke at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig.
We tend to think of Beethoven as the first composer of major works for cello and piano, but Brahms reached further back for his inspiration for this work to baroque models and possibly to Bach’s sonatas for bass viol and harpsichord (which had first been published in 1860). Many commentators have found echoes of the fugal subject of Bach’s The Art of Fugue in the first movement’s opening theme and in the Sonata’s finale Brahms quotes the Contrapunctus XIII from the same work.
The Sonata has a curious overall shape: a ruminative first movement, lasting almost as long as its other two movements put together, followed by a central dance movement and a fugal finale. In the original scheme of things the Sonata also had a slow movement that Brahms withdrew when he completed the work in 1865. One aspect of the Sonata that persists to this day are the problems with the balance between the cello and piano that Brahms encountered. This was a problem that Beethoven had not faced when he composed his first cello sonatas back in 1796 but, in the intervening years, the piano had become more and more powerful in tone. Brahms acknowledged the parity between the two instruments by reverting to the classical inscription, “Sonata for piano with violoncello”.
The Sonata’s first movement (Allegro non troppo) is brooding and expansive in character with the two instruments pitted together in a continuous dialogue. Its mood is alleviated by the second movement (Allegretto quasi menuetto): a courtly minuet whose slightly ironic manner brought a contemporary flavour to the long dead eighteenth century dance form. The third movement (Allegro) is cast as a three-part fugue (a form in which the same melody is heard entering three times in imitation) driving the work to a restless conclusion, with the cello and piano continuing their battle for supremacy to the end.
Recommended Recording:
Mstislav Rostropovich and Rudolf Serkin. Deutsch Gramophon 410 510-2.
© Peter Reynolds
Thomas Carroll
Thomas Carroll captured First Prize in the 2001 Young Concert Artists International Auditions, as well as the Princeton University Concerts Prize and the Bärenreiter Prize for Strings. Mr. Carroll currently holds the Anne & George Popkin Cello Chair of Young Concert Artists. The Young Concert Artists Series presented his recital debuts in New York at the 92nd Street Y, in Washington, DC at the Kennedy Center and at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, and his New York concerto debut with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s at Alice Tully Hall.
Mr. Carroll has appeared as concerto soloist with the Graz Symphony Orchestra in Austria, the London Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican Centre, the London Mozart Players, the Welsh, Cardiff, East of England and Surrey Philharmonic Orchestras, the European Community Chamber Orchestra, the City of London Chamber Orchestra and the Munich Youth Symphony.
Thomas Carroll performed the Brahms String Sextet in G Major with Yehudi Menuhin in a concert at St. James’ Palace in London for the Duchess of Kent, and has also performed chamber music with Gidon Kremer, Eugene Istomin, Christian Tetzlaff and the Endellion Quartet. He has given solo recitals in Tunisia for the British Council, at Wigmore Hall and the Purcell Room in London, at the Chagall Museum in Nice, and has performed at the Gstaad Menuhin Festival (Switzerland), the Kronberg Festival (Germany), the City of London Festival, the Harrogate Festival, and the International Musicians’ Seminar at Prussia Cove. Mr. Carroll also performs in recital throughout the U.S., including engagements this season for the Buffalo Chamber Music Society and at California’s Mondavi Center for the Arts.
Thomas Carroll’s numerous honors include First Prizes in the 2000 Johannes Brahms Cello Competition in Austria, the 1999 Maisie Lewis Young Artists Award, the 1999 Young Concert Artists European Auditions in Leipzig and the 1992 BBC Young Musicians’ Competition for Strings, and scholarships from the Julius Isserlis Foundation, the Welsh Arts Council and the Ian Flemming Trust.
Born in Swansea, Wales, Thomas Carroll entered the Yehudi Menuhin School at the age of nine, where he studied with Melissa Phelps for ten years. He then continued his studies with Heinrich Schiff at the Musikhochschule in Vienna. Mr. Carroll is also on the roster of Young Concert Artists Trust in London.
Simon Lepper
Simon Lepper was educated at King’s College Cambridge and the Royal Academy of Music where he studied piano with Michael Dussek. Whilst a student he won every major award for piano accompaniment including the Gerald Moore Award and the accompanist prizes in the Kathleen Ferrier and Royal Over-Seas League competitions. He became an Associate of the Royal Academy of Music in 2005 and teaches chamber music and song accompaniment at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama. Simon has recently been appointed as Professor of Piano Accompaniment at the Royal College of Music, London.
He has performed with singers including Cora Burggraaf, Nicole Cabell, Karen Cargill, Allan Clayton, Ronan Collett, Lucy Crowe, Gillian Keith, Gweneth-Ann Jeffers, Angelika Kirchschlager, Andrew Kennedy, Stephan Loges, Sally Matthews, Robert Murray, Mark Padmore, Felicity Palmer, Joan Rodgers, Kate Royal, James Rutherford, Bryn Terfel, Ailish Tynan, Elizabeth Watts and Roderick Williams. His keen interest in chamber music has led to performances with clarinettists Julian Bliss and Jorg Widmann, violinists Renaud Capuçon, Chlöe Hanslip, Jack Liebeck, Alexander Sitkovetsky and Carolin Widmann and cellists Daniel Müller-Schott and Gemma Rosefield.
Simon is an official accompanist for the BBC Singer of the World Rosenblatt Song Prize and Yehudi Menuhin Violin Competition and plays for Thomas Quasthoff’s masterclasses at the Verbier Festival.
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Claude Debussy (1862–1918)
Sonata for Violin and Piano in G minor
2 Intermède (fantasque e léger)
3 Finale - Très animé
The Violin Sonata was the third of an intended series of six sonatas, for different combinations of instruments, on which Debussy worked from 1915. In the event, only three were ever completed, all of which were written against the background of the cancer that was to claim Debussy in 1918. The title of Sonata alone marks a seismic change in Debussy's aesthetic development, suggesting a link to the classicism that, earlier in his career, he had so strongly condemned: "(I) hate classical development whose beauty is only technical and can interest only the highbrows." However, in common his contemporaries (Busoni, for instance), the later Debussy discovered that he could achieve a radical synthesis of his earlier techniques within the dialectics of classical form. Early commentators were inclined to see a decline in Debussy's later music (writing in 1924 Cecil Gray called the Sonatas, "by a long way the worst things he ever wrote"), but in more recent years these late pieces have been recognised as amongst Debussy's finest achievements, formally daring, innovative with his musical language pared down to its bare essentials.
The Violin Sonata was the last of the three to be completed, written in the darkest days of the Great War in 1916-17 and, indeed, was Debussy's own swansong. "I only wrote the Sonata to be rid of the thing, spurred on as I was by my dear publisher," wrote Debussy. "This Sonata will be interesting from a documentary viewpoint as an example of what may be produced by a sick man in time of war." Debussy described the Finale's theme as being, "subjected to the most curious deformations, ultimately leaving the impression of an idea turning back on itself like a snake biting its own tale."
Lasting just a little over twelve minutes, the three movements are terse, epigrammatic and give the impression of being thrown off with lightening rapidity in an unflagging jet of white hot inspiration. Debussy himself took part in the first performance in Paris in May 1917. It was to be his last appearance in Paris and a contemporary wrote, "... his complexion was the colour of melted wax, or of ashes. In his eyes there was no feverish flame but the dull reflections of silent pools." © Peter Reynolds
Recommended Recording: Kyung Wha Chung (violin) & Radu Lupu (piano). Decca 460 006-2. (With the Franck Sonata & Chausson Poème)
William Mathias (1934-92)
Sonata for Violin and Piano, Op 15
1 Molto vivace
2 Lento, ma con moto
3 Lento - Allegro ritmico
The overall tonal structure and argument is strongly involved with tensions implied in the relationship between C sharp, E, and D – as immediately laid bare in the work's opening bars. The first movement (centred on C sharp) alternates a spiky and aggressively rhythmic idea with flowing melodic lines, generating a number of strong contrasts of mood as it proceeds.
The central movement (in E) opens with something of the character of a 'berceuse'. The concept of a comforting lullaby is nevertheless belied by the logical progression of the music towards a climax of great intensity - the movement as a whole is one of intense and deeply-felt lyricism.
The work must be heard as a whole in that Movements I and II find their ultimate resolution in the shorter finale, which works its way (following a brief Lento transition) from a strongly rhythmic beginning to a music of 'flow' characterised by iridescent semiquaver patterns in the piano (already hinted at towards the end of the slow movement). The three-note motif is again pervasive as the Sonata moves towards its final resolution in a clear D Major. © William Mathias
Recommended Recording: Today’s performers have recently completed a CD recording of both Mathias’s Violin Sonatas for (label) which will be available shortly.
Edward Elgar (1857-1934)
Sonata for Violin and Piano in E minor, Op 82
1 Allegro
2 Romance: Andante
3 Allegro non troppo
The closing years of the Great War found Elgar plagued by illness, irritated by wartime London and creatively barren. More and more his thoughts turned to the past, and his wife, Alice, realising the importance of recapturing the peace and solitude of earlier years, found a simple thatched cottage, Brinkwells, near Fittleworth in Sussex on an isolated hill overlooking the Arun and South Downs. This was to be their home through much of 1918-19. As the war dragged on into its final stages, Elgar turned his back on the world and in an increasing mood of nostalgia began to sketch music once again. The fruits of this period were to be the Violin Sonata, String Quartet, Piano Quintet and, finally the Cello Concerto.
As spring turned to summer and the war dragged on into its final stages, Alice Elgar wrote in her diary, "E writing wonderful new music, different from anything else of his. A calls it wood magic." We cannot be sure what this music was as Elgar was working simultaneously on sketches for the Violin Sonata, String Quartet and Piano Quintet during that summer. However, it was the Violin Sonata that he first completed. Elgar's friend, the violinist W.H.Reed was a frequent visitor to Brinkwells during the period, playing thorough works with Elgar as they were sketched. The Sonata was completed on 1 October 1918. Just four days before Elgar wrote to a friend, "here we have had much bad weather but the sunrises have been wonderful ... I have never seen anything so wonderful as the sun climbing over our view in golden mist. I now see where Turner found such sights as Norham Castle."
The intensity of those days and the actual landscape found its way into Elgar's music. A group of withered trees said to be connected with a fraternity of Spanish monks who had been struck by lightening while practising satanic rites also found their way into the second movement of the Sonata. W. H. Reed described the, "haunted trees with gnarled and twisted branches, bare of bark or leaves - a ghastly sight in the evening, when the branches seem to be beckoning"
Elgar described the Sonata's first movement as bold and vigorous, though we are likely to find it more restless and nervy. The second movement he described as "fantastic and curious ... with a very expressive middle section" (this referred to the trees mentioned above), while the last movement was described as, "very broad and soothing, like the last movement of the Second Symphony. I have been sketching other things which are full of old times."
The first performance was given by Reed and Anthony Bernard in London on 13 March 1919. The critics' reception of the work was muted as it was also the case for the premieres of the Quartet, Quintet and Cello Concerto, given later that year. While for many the post-war period signalled a new dawn, for Elgar it signified a passing of worlds. In the week following the completion of the Sonata, its dedicatee Marie Joshua died along with the composer Hubert Parry. Within another two years Elgar's wife, Alice would follow. On a sheet of paper he copied words from Swinburne:
"Keep silence now, for singing-time is over,
And over all old things and all things dear."
© Peter Reynolds
Recommended Recording: Nigel Kennedy (violin) & Peter Pettinger (piano). Chandos 8380. (with other Elgar works by violin and piano).
Sara Trickey brings her "beautifully refined tone" (Musical Opinion) and her "fiery and passionate" performance style (The Strad) to her award-winning career as both solo violinist and chamber musician. She studied at the Royal College of Music, at Cambridge University (where she achieved a double starred First in Classics), and at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music as a Scholarship Student of Camilla Wicks. She has also studied with Emanuel Hurwitz, Pauline Scott and Mark Knight in London and with Joey Corpus in New York.
In duo recital she has appeared with Stephen Kovacevich, Roger Vignoles, William Howard and Tom Poster. As winner of the Grace Williams Memorial Prize she appeared at St David's Hall in Cardiff, where she performed again in January 2007 with Tom Poster. She has also appeared at the Purcell Room, the Royal Opera House, and live on Radio 3. In her duo with Andrew Watkinson, leader of the Endellion Quartet, she continues to explore the repertoire for two violins.
Recently performed repertoire includes the Britten, Bach, Sibelius, Mendelssohn, Goldmark, Brahms and Beethoven concertos as well as Vaughan Williams’s The Lark Ascending and Piazzolla’s tango-inspired Four Seasons. She has performed concertos with the City of London Sinfonia, the Orchestra of St John’s Smith Square under John Lubbock, the New London Soloists Ensemble, the South Bank Sinfonia, the Haydn Chamber Orchestra, the St. David’s Chamber Orchestra and the Ten Tors Orchestra among others. In 2007 she played the Khachaturian, Bruch Double and Bruch G minor concertos and the Mendelssohn E minor concerto on tour in Northern France. She also performed at the St Magnus, Cheltenham and Lichfield Festivals and was the featured violinist at the Presteigne Festival.
Sara was leader of the Bronte string quartet between 2001 and 2006. The quartet was prize-winners at the 2005 international competition in Cremona and won first prize at the Royal Overseas League competition in 2003. They performed at many of the UK's major venues and festivals.
Iwan Llewelyn-Jones. Described in the Daily Telegraph as 'seemingly conjuring a whole orchestra from his instrument', Iwan Llewelyn-Jones is now established as one of Britain's most imaginative and successful pianists. He has performed to audiences world wide, and in 2006 makes his North American solo recital debut in San Francisco, and will perform in Wigmore Hall's prestigious Sunday Morning Coffee Concert series.
Iwan studied at Oxford University and the Royal College of Music where he won several awards and competitions for both academic and pianistic excellence. Further prizes followed in international piano competitions in Spain, France, Italy and Great Britain.
His repertoire is wide-ranging incorporating keyboard music from the Baroque era to the present day. In 1999 he performed six recitals devoted to the music of Frederic Chopin and in 2004 gave a series of recitals at Wigmore Hall focussing on the life and works of Francis Poulenc. He has a special affinity with 19th and 20th century French music and recently released a CD of solo works entitled French Portraits. In addition he is actively involved in promoting new music. Composers who have written works especially for him include Alun Hoddinott, John Metcalf, John Pickard, Pwyll ap Siôn, Karl Jenkins and Lowell Liebermann. A CD of solo contemporary Welsh music ('Welsh Portraits') was released in 2001. In 2005, Iwan Llewelyn-Jones was awarded the Sir Geraint Evans Award by the Welsh Music Guild in recognition of his support for and promotion of Welsh music.
In addition to his solo recital performances, Iwan has performed concertos by Mozart, Chopin and Litolff with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, and is an experienced chamber musician. In 2004 he formed his own chamber music group consisting of young Welsh musicians, devoted to promoting new solo and chamber works alongside the mainstream repertoire.
Sunday 18 October 11.30am at the National Museum Cardiff
This Sonata was written for Tessa Robbins and Robin Wood who gave its first performance at the 1962 Cheltenham Festival.