Five bagatelles for clarinet and piano, Op 23 Gerald Finzi (1901-1956)
1. Prelude. Allegro deciso; 2. Romance. Andante tranquillo; 3. Carol. Andantino semplice; 4. Forlana. Allegretto grazioso; 5. Fughetta. Allegro vivace.
It was typical of Finzi to dismiss his Five Bagatelles as trifles but they are utterly characteristic of the composer in their unpretentious lyricism.
It is not known exactly when the first four were written. He may have begun them in 1938 but it is thought that most of the work on No 1 was done around New Year 1942 and that Nos 2-4 followed in June and July of that year. In any case, they were based on what Finzi described as ‘twenty year-old bits and pieces’, as with much of his other music that found its eventual form over a period of several years.
They were written for Pauline Juler, a young clarinettist who abandoned her career after getting married in 1948. She gave the first performance with composer and pianist Howard Ferguson at a National Gallery concert in January 1943. Finzi added the concluding Fughetta – the only completely new movement - the following summer, after a number of friends and colleagues suggested that the set needed a quick finale.
The outer sections of the purposeful ‘Prelude’ are based on a rising scale figure. Of the two tender, song-like pieces which follow, ‘Carol’ is based on a song that Finzi wrote for Herbert Howells’ then four-year-old daughter Ursula, setting words by Ivor Gurney beginning, “Winter now has bared the tree”. ‘Forlana’ is a slowish, lilting dance, while ‘Fughetta’ is lively, with a delightfully unexpected throwaway ending.
Clarinet Sonata in F minor, Op 120 no 1 Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)
1. Allegro appassionato; 2. Andante, un poco adagio; 3. Allegretto grazioso; 4. Vivace.
When Brahms completed his G major String Quintet, Op 111, in 1890 he intended it to be his last work – ‘it really is time to stop’, he wrote to his publisher Fritz Simrock. The following year he met the clarinettist Richard Mühlfeld whose playing of Mozart and Weber so haunted him that, during the summer, he produced the Clarinet Quintet and the Trio for clarinet, cello and piano, Op 114. Three years later he added the two clarinet sonatas, Op 120, the first important works of their kind. The grace and sensitivity of Mühlfeld’s playing earned him the nickname ‘Fräulein Klarinette’; Brahms called him ‘my Primadonna’. All four works reflect this characteristic in clarinet writing which calls much more for refinement and delicacy than for virtuoso display. Together they form a body of work whose essence is neatly summed up by Brahms’ biographer, Jan Swafford: ‘Perhaps the clarinet pieces are the only true love songs to an instrument Brahms ever wrote.’
Brahms subsequently adapted the clarinet parts for viola, so creating the first major sonatas for that instrument as well; he also went on to produce versions for violin, which involved making adjustments to the piano part.
The key of F minor had previously triggered some of Brahms’ stormiest and most passionate music, including the Piano Quintet and Third Symphony. The mood in the F minor Sonata’s first movement is more subdued, the textures sparer and more concentrated, the melodic writing warm and lyrical. But the drive and intensity are as strong as ever.
The slow movement is almost a song without words, intimate and wistful, like many of the piano Intermezzi Brahms published a couple of years before. To bridge the gap between that and the energetic finale Brahms writes a gentle waltz-like movement, with a central section which begins by exploring the clarinet’s lowest register. The finale itself is a rondo with a pert, lively main theme. It is contrasted with more expansive, relaxed material, before ending the sonata in a mood of warm good humour.
Scaramouche, Op 165b Darius Milhaud (1892-1974)
1. Vif; 2. Modéré; 3. Brazileira. Mouvement de Samba.
Like many composers who wrote music for the theatre or cinema, Milhaud frequently gave his stage and film scores an extra lease of life by re-using them in concert works.
The first and third movements of Scaramouche are based on music which he wrote in 1937 for a production for children of Le médecin volant (The Flying Doctor), an early farce by the great seventeenth-century French comic dramatist Molière. ‘Scaramouche’ was the name of the theatre company involved, taken from one of the stock characters of the Neapolitan traditional theatre known as the comedia dell’arte; it was also the stage name of a well-known seventeenth-century Neapolitan comic actor who brought his theatre company to Paris and became a friend and colleague of Molière.
Milhaud adapted the music originally as a suite for two pianos, but apparently thought very little of the result. He was reluctant to have it published believing that no-one would want to buy it but it has become one of his most popular works. He also made versions for clarinet and for alto saxophone with orchestra or piano.
The outer movements are full of his characteristic infectious exuberance. The middle movement draws on another theatre score, the overture he wrote for a Comédie-Française production, Bolivar; it is tenderly lyrical, with a middle section rocking gently like a lullaby. The samba-rhythm finale is one of Milhaud’s many tributes to the popular music of Brazil, which had so captivated him during his time there as secretary to French ambassador Paul Claudel during the First World War.
© Mike Wheeler, 2011