Jennifer
Stinton was the top flute student when I was at the Royal
Academy of Music, and I remember being delighted to have the
chance to deputise in the big Academy orchestras when she was
so advanced as to have become almost invisible – constantly
away gigging in the big professional orchestras in London or
other such major league employment. I was only entrusted with
such work after giving everyone a fright by nearly winning the
York Bowen prize – adjudicated by the late lamented and greatly
missed Sebastian Bell. I was always going to come second to
Jenny however, and of course she went on to record numerous
excellent CDs for Collins Classics, now re-issued on the Regis
label.
Hidden
Tango is full of light
and attractive pieces, with the accurate and articulate flute
of Jennifer Stinton accompanied by the colourful and many-sided
guitar playing of Richard Hand. The title may deceive a few
seekers of dance tangos, for there are plenty of works here
which have nothing whatever to do with that particular musical
genre. Debussy’s Syrinx for instance is a typical flautist’s
standby filler, and I suspect that is why it is included here.
Nicely turned as the performance is here, I would have preferred
a little more red-blooded passion in Pan’s cry of anguish towards
the end. Gareth Morris used to paint more of a dreamily nostalgic
picture of that moment for us in his lessons, but times have
changed, and I look for grim emotional terrors at that point
these days.
I
am however getting ahead of myself. Stephen Goss’s suite of
short pieces From Honey to Ashes, is full of gems – jazzy
and poetic. There are plenty of opportunities for the guitarist
to display a variety of effects, from percussive slaps and damped
strings, to the more conventional gestures one might normally
expect. Even the simpler movements, such as Flutes and Fiddles
have interesting rhythmic wrinkles, and this is a piece all
such duos should make an effort to discover.
Astor
Piazzolla’s Histoire du Tango is a famous work for this
combination, and the Hand/Stinton duo makes an excellent job
of it. The piece presents ‘the tango’ in four different settings,
from Bordel 1900 to Concert d’aujourd’hui. Again,
I particularly enjoy Hand’s variety of colour, and his skilful
vibrato in the solo towards the beginning of Café 1930.
The tango theme is continued in Jerry Owen’s Hidden Tango,
which the composer describes as ‘not a picture of the dance
itself, but an abstract of the energy and sentiment of the dance
of love.’ There are whiffs and elements of this Argentinian
sensibility, and the piece has a nice feel of narrative, moving
from the gently pastoral to the folksy via a more sensual central
section – not earth shattering, but highly attractive nonetheless.
The
famous Aria from the Bachianas Brasileiras No.5 by
Villa-Lobos arranged for flute and guitar works well enough
to start with: the plucked strings imitating the cellos in the
opening. The more passionate second section has however, alas,
all the impact of a banana skin on a bass drum, and I wonder
at the wisdom of not playing that highly charged melody an octave
higher in the flute. A question of balance perhaps, but the
result is rather beige I’m sorry to say, and contributes little
to the programme as a whole.
Fauré’s Morceau
de Concours is rather unusual as a test piece for the Paris
Conservatoire, where displays of sheer virtuosity were more often
the order of the day. This work is intended to provide an example
of musicianship and lyrical abilities, and Stinton traverses some
long melodic lines with easy grace. Lyrical melody is also the
principal characteristic of Erik Satie’s Gnosiennes and
Gymnopédies, and for these works an arrangement for flute
and guitar is a logical one. I don’t prefer these to the piano
originals, where the sustaining qualities of the melodic line
are an artifice and illusion created by an unspoken complicity
between the skill of the pianist and the suggestibility of the
listener. The function of the guitar as left-hand also means an
eternally unequal partnership in these pieces, and I’ve stopped
playing them myself with piano accompaniment partly for the reason
that I sense my pianist losing the will to live after about 5
minutes – but then, my pianist is only really happy when he’s
playing Scriabin. The performances on this disc are of course
very musical, and one or other of the two sets would probably
have been fine. To have both, one after the other, makes for a
somewhat somnolent conclusion.
To
sum up, this is a bit of a mixed bag – one half really interesting
material, the other being famous pieces either feeling a little
stranded, or having the character of the kind of nice background
music organised for quasi-chic dinners on a daily basis. Either
way the playing is as good as I expected it to be, so if the pieces
and the combination interest I am sure you will not be disappointed.
Dominy Clements
Jennifer Stinton (flute) 
