MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2024
60,000 reviews
... and still writing ...

Search MusicWeb Here Acte Prealable Polish CDs
 

Presto Music CD retailer
 
Founder: Len Mullenger                                    Editor in Chief:John Quinn             


 REVIEW

Some items
to consider

new MWI
Current reviews

old MWI
pre-2023 reviews

paid for
advertisements

Acte Prealable Polish recordings

Forgotten Recordings
Forgotten Recordings
All Forgotten Records Reviews

TROUBADISC
Troubadisc Weinberg- TROCD01450

All Troubadisc reviews


FOGHORN Classics

Alexandra-Quartet
Brahms String Quartets

All Foghorn Reviews


All HDTT reviews


Songs to Harp from
the Old and New World


all Nimbus reviews



all tudor reviews


Follow us on Twitter


Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Editor in Chief
John Quinn
Contributing Editor
Ralph Moore
Webmaster
   David Barker
Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf
MusicWeb Founder
   Len Mullenger

alternatively
CD: Crotchet


Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART (1756-1791)
Clarinet Concerto In A major K622 (1791) [27:15]
Clarinet Quintet in A major K581 (1789) [31:25]
Paul Dean (clarinet)
The Queensland Orchestra/Guillaume Tourniaire
The Grainger Quartet
rec. Studio 420, Ferry Road, ABC Brisbane, 18-19 September 2008 (Concerto); City Recital Hall, Angel Place, Sydney, 20-21 August 2008 (Quintet)
MELBA MR301122 [58:42]
Experience Classicsonline

The front cover bears the words “Sublime Mozart” and few will disagree with those terms in respect of these works. There is however always the risk that their very perfection may engender a blandness in performance. Performers can be all too aware that any positive response on their part to the music may lead to a negative response in some listeners. Thus we hear too many faceless performances, no doubt played with great beauty of tone and no doubt lacking real interaction with the music.
 
Fortunately that is very much not the case here, especially with the Quintet. The music is thoughtfully and vividly characterized throughout. At no time is this a routine performance, but neither does it fall into the trap of drawing too much attention to the performance per se. Rather it sounds like five sincere and gifted musicians responding to a great masterwork in an apparently spontaneous way - although I have no doubt that it was in fact very carefully prepared. There are so many outstanding performances of this work in the catalogues that it would be foolish to claim that this might be the “best” available, but it is certainly one well worth hearing and well worth having if you want this very logical coupling.
 
Similar considerations apply to the Concerto, although here I am not so certain about the orchestra’s contribution. This is very beautifully played but lacks the kind of specific response to the music or the soloist that could make it a great performance. Nonetheless the soloist’s performance is of such quality that it is worth hearing on his account. He was in fact Principal Clarinet with this Orchestra from 1987 to 2000 although I understand from the booklet that he now divides his time between a number of Australian musical groups.
 
The recording is excellent without drawing undue attention to itself. Like earlier Melba discs that I have encountered, the presentation here is excellent, with the disc clipped inside the front cover of a very smart-looking booklet which contains photographs, good notes on the music in English, German and French, and notes on the performers in English only. The latter lists the members of the Grainger Quartet. As this information is not included anywhere else in the booklet and as they deserve individual recognition I repeat them here – Narsuko Yoshimoto and James Cuddeford (violins), Jeremy Williams (viola) and Patrick Murphy (cello). The members of the orchestra are also individually listed – a feature that other companies should copy.
 
The disc is dedicated to Dame Elisabeth Murdoch AC DBE on her 100th birthday on 9 February 2009. This must have been an excellent birthday present which I hope she enjoyed as much as I did.
 
John Sheppard
 

 


Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos reviews

Hyperion recordings
All Hyperion reviews

Foghorn recordings
All Foghorn reviews

Troubadisc recordings
All Troubadisc reviews



all Bridge reviews


all cpo reviews

Divine Art recordings
Click to see New Releases
Get 10% off using code musicweb10
All Divine Art reviews


All Eloquence reviews

Lyrita recordings
All Lyrita Reviews

 

Wyastone New Releases
Obtain 10% discount

Subscribe to our free weekly review listing

 

 


EXPLORE MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL

Making a Donation to MusicWeb

Writing CD reviews for MWI

About MWI
Who we are, where we have come from and how we do it.

Site Map

How to find a review

How to find articles on MusicWeb
Listed in date order

Review Indexes
   By Label
      Select a label and all reviews are listed in Catalogue order
   By Masterwork
            Links from composer names (eg Sibelius) are to resource pages with links to the review indexes for the individual works as well as other resources.

Themed Review pages

Jazz reviews

 

Discographies
   Composer
      Composer surveys
   National
      Unique to MusicWeb -
a comprehensive listing of all LP and CD recordings of given works
.
Prepared by Michael Herman

The Collector’s Guide to Gramophone Company Record Labels 1898 - 1925
Howard Friedman

Book Reviews

Complete Books
We have a number of out of print complete books on-line

Interviews
With Composers, Conductors, Singers, Instumentalists and others
Includes those on the Seen and Heard site

Nostalgia

Nostalgia CD reviews

Records Of The Year
Each reviewer is given the opportunity to select the best of the releases

Monthly Best Buys
Recordings of the Month and Bargains of the Month

Comment
Arthur Butterworth Writes

An occasional column

Phil Scowcroft's Garlands
British Light Music articles

Classical blogs
A listing of Classical Music Blogs external to MusicWeb International

Reviewers Logs
What they have been listening to for pleasure

Announcements

 

Community
Bulletin Board

Give your opinions or seek answers

Reviewers
Past and present

Helpers invited!

Resources
How Did I Miss That?

Currently suspended but there are a lot there with sound clips


Composer Resources

British Composers

British Light Music Composers

Other composers

Film Music (Archive)
Film Music on the Web (Closed in December 2006)

Programme Notes
For concert organizers

External sites
British Music Society
The BBC Proms
Orchestra Sites
Recording Companies & Retailers
Online Music
Agents & Marketing
Publishers
Other links
Newsgroups
Web News sites etc

PotPourri
A pot-pourri of articles

MW Listening Room
MW Office

Advice to Windows Vista users  
Questionnaire    
Site History  
What they say about us
What we say about us!
Where to get help on the Internet
CD orders By Special Request
Graphics archive
Currency Converter
Dictionary
Magazines
Newsfeed  
Web Ring
Translation Service

Rules for potential reviewers :-)
Do Not Go Here!
April Fools




Return to Review Index

Untitled Document


Reviews from previous months
Join the mailing list and receive a hyperlinked weekly update on the discs reviewed. details
We welcome feedback on our reviews. Please use the Bulletin Board
Please paste in the first line of your comments the URL of the review to which you refer.