BY TIM HANNAH
Bridge, Muhly, Prokofiev
Melbourne Chamber Players
Primrose Potter Salon, Melbourne Recital Centre, 29 April
The Melbourne Recital Centre’s Local Heroes series, now in its eighth year, has become a mainstay of local chamber music performance and an opportunity to see some of the city’s leading musicians in the intimate setting of the Primrose Potter Salon.
The Melbourne Chamber Players, co-founded in 2017 by clarinettist Justin Beere and oboist Stephanie Dixon, is one of the latest additions to this series in 2019. In their first outing on Monday night they displayed first-hand the calibre of musicians this series is attracting.
Beere’s opening remarks set a confident tone for the evening, with an explanation of the somewhat tenuous programmatic link between the chosen works quickly overlooked in the face of his obvious love for the music to be performed. That programmatic link? All composers on the program were chosen for their role as “musical revolutionaries”.
Frank Bridge is not a composer that immediately comes to mind when that phrase is uttered. However, the performance of his Phantasy for Piano Quartet in F-sharp Minor was a wonderfully executed opening to the program. The work, written in 1910, has a neatly symmetrical structure and, with its long melodic phrases and rich harmonies, gave us a chance to hear the ensemble’s string players in their element. Pianist Aidan Boase also deserves special mention for his sensitivity to the role of the piano as accompanist and soloist throughout the work, his playing providing timbral depth and structural clarity.
Perhaps it was the effect of Beere’s opening “revolutionary” remarks, by you could almost hear the echo of things to come in the excitement of the middle Allegro vivace movement. A slight subversion of the pastoralism we’ve come to expect from English composers of Bridge’s generation.
Nico Muhly’s Motion brought us abruptly into the 21st Century. The ensemble’s performance clearly displayed the collective skill of the musicians, now joined by Beere on clarinet.
There is no concertmaster in chamber music. No conductor. It is both frightening and freeing at the same time, and during this rhythmically challenging work the ensemble members clearly displayed their individual skill and musical rapport. It was a wonderful visual and aural masterclass on musical communication. For any audience members unfamiliar with Muhly’s work, it was also a welcome introduction to a prolific living composer.
The final work on the program, Prokofiev’s Quintet in G minor, Op. 39, was the highlight of the performance and welcomed both artistic directors to the stage for the first time – Beere and Stephanie Dixon. Dixon’s clear-toned oboe in the opening theme and variations was a welcome and laudable addition.
The work’s odd instrumentation for oboe, clarinet, violin, viola, and bass (the only instruments Prokofiev had at his disposal at the time of composition) creates some unique textural challenges for any ensemble wanting to tackle the work. However, Beere’s clarinet provided an excellent linchpin for this performance, his upper range blending seamlessly with Dixon’s oboe and his lower range merging imperceptibly with Emma Sullivan’s double bass. Yi Wang’s violin and Katie Yap’s viola provided the necessary bite to the performance to which seasoned Prokofiev listeners would be accustomed. The choice to stand for this work (all other works were performed seated) seemed to inject new energy into the musicians, producing a highly engaging performance.
The quintet ends, strangely, with a somewhat anticlimactic slower movement. Rather than feeling deflated, though, this performance came to a confident conclusion, which left us wanting more and enthusiastically looking forward to the next outing of this wonderful ensemble.
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Image supplied.
