by MARTIN BOOKSPAN
MOZART'S CLARINET QUINTET
SCRATCH almost any orchestral musician and you will uncover a frustrated chamber-music player. Behavioral psychologists might have a field day with this fact, but the chief reason seems fairly obvious: constant involvement in orchestral performance demands a self-abnegation on the part of the individual musician that is not too far removed from self-destruction. Playing chamber music, on the other hand, elevates each single per former to a position of spotlighted importance. Added to this is the pleasure to be de rived from a cooperative joint effort involving relatively few other participants.
The riches and the glories of chamber music literature are boundless. Composers over the years have reserved some of their most deeply felt and intensely personal thoughts for the chamber music medium. Some of the most sublime musical inspiration ever conceived in Western culture is to be found, for example, in a Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, or Rochberg string quartet. Some works, such as Schubert's C Major String Quintet, seemingly have the power to transport performer and listener alike to another realm of existence altogether.
Then there are other works that delight through the sheer exuberance, the animal good spirits of their expression, while being at the same time so ingeniously crafted and so rich in invention as to astound us with their musical perfection. Such a work, surely, is Mozart's Clarinet Quintet in A Major, my nomination as the work in the chamber-music repertoire to serve as an introduction to the genre for the newly-interested enthusiast.
DURING the last decade of his life, Mozart lived in Vienna. Anton Stadler. the superb principal clarinetist of the court orchestra, quickly became a close friend of the composer, and it was from Stadler that Mozart learned the capacities and limitations of the instrument. Mozart, in turn, produced for Stadler a whole series of works that are among the chief glories of music: these include the Trio for Clarinet, Viola, and Piano, the Clarinet Concerto, and of course the Quintet for Clarinet and Strings.
The Clarinet Quintet is distinguished by extraordinary clarity, long-breathed melodies, pages of hushed pathos, and, finally, rollicking good spirits. It is hard to believe that anyone could profess to love music who did not respond to this irresistible score with immediate affection.
There are a number of excellent recorded performances of this music available currently. chief among them being the performances that feature the two leading British clarinetists of our time: Jack Brymer and Gervase de Peyer. Brymer plays with the Allegri String Quartet (Philips 6500073) and De Peyer with members of London's Melos Ensemble (Angel S 3624 I ). Both, coincidentally, couple the quintet with the Clarinet, Viola, and Piano Trio on their discs. If I prefer De Peyer's performance to Brymer's, it is by the slimmest of margins, and only because De Peyer invests his playing with a shade more personality.
Among other available recordings of the quintet, I would single out for special praise those involving leading clarinetists in American symphony orchestras: Harold Wright, principal clarinet with the Boston Symphony, and Peter Simenauer, associate principal clarinet with the New York Philharmonic.
Wright's (Columbia MS 7447) is the product of recording sessions held at Rudolf Serkin's summer musical oasis in Marlboro, Vermont, and his associates in the performance are an ad hoc string quartet made up of Alexander Schneider and Isidore Cohen, violins: Samuel Rhodes. viola: and Leslie Parnas. cello. Simenauer's recording (Monitor S 2115) is with the Pascal Quartet. Both Wright and Simenauer (as well as their respective colleagues) favor a more assertive approach than do their British counterparts, and the recorded sound on their discs is likewise more sharply focused, with consequent keener spotlighting of the individual instruments involved. Brymer and De Peyer however, bask in a warmer, more resonant acoustic ambiance.
But whether your preference is for Brymer or De Peyer or Simenauer or Wright, get a recording of Mozart's Clarinet Quintet as quickly as possible and then settle back to enjoy one of music's most spontaneous and delightful pleasures, a perfect introduction to the world of chamber music.
The 1975 UPDATING OF THE BASIC REPERTOIRE is now available in convenient pamphlet form. Send 25ยข and a stamped, self-addressed #10 (9 1/2 x 4 1/8 in.) envelope to Diane Nakamura, Stereo Review, 1 Park Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10016 for your copy.
Also see:
CHOOSING SIDES, IRVING KOLODIN
THE SIMELS REPORT, STEVE SIMELS
Source: Stereo Review (USA magazine)