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Christ Church Cathedral
August 17, 2019
There are times when, with a gun to my head and a demand to nominate just a single work to represent Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in my library, I would unhesitatingly choose the Clarinet Quintet.
Of course, these occasions are typically when I am actually listening to the quintet; at others I might opt for the Clarinet Concerto or one of the many Piano Concertos (although deciding between numbers 17, 19, 21 and 23 might prove tricky).
I should probably also point out that if the gun-at-the-head demand were to choose a single piece of music to live with for the remainder of my life, I'd probably pull the trigger myself and have done with it.
These thoughts, actually rather less gloomy than it might appear, were prompted by the exceptional performance of the quintet given by Keith MacLeod and "friends" — Tori Lindsay, Courtney Cameron, Kay Cochran and Alasdair Money — which closed their recital on Saturday last.
The work's opening was perfectly poised, beautifully setting the stage for the entry of the clarinet, which introduced a new sound world to chamber music and one which, judging by the number of clarinet quintets composed since Mozart, found a ready audience.
The exposition repeat was, thankfully, taken (when the performance is this good, anything which prolongs it is entirely welcome); the development had a slightly more edgy feel than one often hears, but this made the recapitulation's sense of coming home all the more exquisite.
The slow movement was one long, seamless flow of melody and entirely delectable; whereas the minuet possessed a delightful lilt to its triple-time rhythm and, in its second trio, a captivating gentle bounce.
The finale — unusually for the time, when a rondo would have been the convention — is a set of variations, whose theme was almost perky. Although the entire movement is basically one long highlight, I must mention Cochran's plaintive viola in the third, minor key, variation; the bubbling fourth variation; the thoughtful, musing fifth; and the final variation-cum-coda which bounced its way to its glorious conclusion.
As the audience left the cathedral after the recital, I imagine that every single one of us was smiling. I know I was.
The combination of a soprano with a clarinet quintet is, to say the least, not common. Indeed, all four of the vocal items on the programme had been specifically arranged for the group by MacLeod himself; his incentive, presumably, being to give himself (and friends) the opportunity to accompany his talented daughter, Heather MacLeod.
George Gershwin's "Summertime" was probably, in some ways, the most familiar of all the music performed. Heather (you must excuse the apparent over-familiarity, but having two performers with the same last name does not seem to have been anticipated by the authors of the Chicago Manual of Style) caught the more sombre side of the music, reminding us that, for the majority of the characters of Porgy and Bess the living was far from "easy".
Sergei Rachmaninov wrote some eighty-three songs in total, although he dubbed most of them "romances", including the two performed.
The first was Op.21 No.7, "How Fair is the Spot", a setting of a poem by Glafira Adol'fovna Galina. This, a single ten-line stanza, was short and most definitely sweet.
"Oh, never sing to me again", Op.4 No.4, to a poem by Pushkin (also set, in part, by Glinka) was another matter. The text speaks of being reminded of "that other life and distant shore" and is shot through with a vein of disconsolate nostalgia, which Heather conveyed perfectly, with even a hint of what one thinks of as typically Russian histrionics, although it was merely a hint — the histrionics can easily be overdone, but not here.
For her final item, Heather sang another piece dubbed "romance" but this time it was by Schubert. Moreover, it was not one of Schubert's 600-plus lieder, the backbone of the art-song repertoire, but from his opera (strictly, singspiel) Die Verschowrenen.
According to various online translation services, "Ich schleiche bang" means "I sneak" and I confess that I am unable to work out exactly how this would fit into a plot which is ultimately, albeit indirectly, derived from Aristophanes' comedy Lysistrata (Λυσιστρατη).
Which is essentially by the by. The romance proved to be quite lovely in a typically Schubertian way, Heather's beautiful voice floating over a gently rocking accompaniment.
To open the programme, we heard Elgar's Chanson de Matin Op.15 No.2 which, despite its title, does not actually feature a singer (although there is a 1960 transcription for voice and piano).
One of Elgar's most popular miniatures, it has been arranged for, inter alia, string quartet, flute and guitar, oboe and piano, viola and piano, and cello and piano.
And now, thanks to Keith, clarinet quintet.
This was a delicious and most stylish way to open the afternoon. The arrangement worked perfectly — indeed, it had that most fundamental feature of all really fine arrangements, sounding as if it could well have been the composer's original version. And the pizzicato ending was simply gorgeous.
I cannot imagine a more rewarding way of spending an hour on a summer's afternoon.
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