The Lilly of Killarney: Clarinet Fantasias from England and Ireland Robert Plane & Benjamin Frith

• Michael William Balfe (1808 - 1870): Fantasia on The Bohemian Girl:
• 1 Balfe: Fantasia on The Bohemian Girl 07:39
• Ernest Tomlinson (1924 - 2015): Conzonetta:
• 2 Tomlinson: Conzonetta 02:45
• Thomas Dunhill (1877 - 1946): Phantasy Suite:
• 3 Dunhill: Phantasy Suite: I. Andante espressivo 01:50
• 4 Dunhill: Phantasy Suite: II. Allegretto 01:19
• 5 Dunhill: Phantasy Suite: III. Allegro con fuoco - Poco animato 01:17
• 6 Dunhill: Phantasy Suite: IV. Andantino serioso 01:42
• 7 Dunhill: Phantasy Suite: V. Vivace assai 00:50
• 8 Dunhill: Phantasy Suite: VI. Andante espressivo - Allegro animato 03:23
• Ruth Gipps (1921 - 1999): Cool Running Water:
• 9 Gipps: Cool Running Water 06:14
• Joseph Holbrooke (1878 - 1958): The Butterfly of the Ballet:
• 10 Holbrooke: The Butterfly of the Ballet 02:14
• Julius Benedict (1804 - 1885): Fantasia on The Lilly of Killarney:
• 11 Benedict: Fantasia on The Lilly of Killarney 15:21
• Elizabeth Maconchy (1907 - 1994): Fantasia:
• 12 Maconchy: Fantasia 09:56
• Thomas Pitfield (1903 - 1999): Conversation Piece:
• 13 Pitfield: Conversation Piece 03:03
• Clarence Raybould (1886 - 1972): The Wistful Shepherd (A Reverie):
• 14 Raybould: The Wistful Shepherd (A Reverie) 04:27
• Howard Ferguson (1908 - 1999): Four Short Pieces:
• 15 Ferguson: Four Short Pieces: I. Prelude Non troppo allegro 01:00
• 16 Ferguson: Four Short Pieces: II. Scherzo. Allegro molto 00:37
• 17 Ferguson: Four Short Pieces: III. Pastoral. Allegretto 02:09
• 18 Ferguson: Four Short Pieces: IV. Burlesque. Con spirito 01:16
• Joseph Holbrooke: Conzonetta (Spring Song):
• 19 Holbrooke: Conzonetta (Spring Song) 03:49
• William Vincent Wallace (1812 - 1865): Fantasia on Maritana:
• 20 Wallace: Fantasia on Maritana 08:26
• Total Runtime 01:19:17

Info zu The Lilly of Killarney: Clarinet Fantasias from England and Ireland

„Fantasy“ ist ein stimmungsvoller Titel, der sich auf eine Reihe kontrastierender musikalischer Formen bezieht. Im Zentrum dieser abwechslungsreichen Sammlung fantastischer anglo-irischer Werke für Klarinette und Klavier stehen Fantasien über Themen aus äußerst populären Opern der Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts, die heute oft als „Irish Ring“ bezeichnet werden. Andere Werke dieser Sammlung, wie Elizabeth Maconchys reife Fantasia, sind von der Phantasie des 16. Jahrhunderts inspiriert, einer Form, die Walter Cobbetts Preis, der etwa 400 Jahre später ins Leben gerufen wurde, maßgeblich wiederbelebte. Thomas Dunhill schuf zwar von Cobbett beeinflusste einsätzige Werke, entschied sich jedoch, seine Phantasy Suite für Klarinette und Klavier in sechs stark charakterisierte Miniaturen zu fassen. Andere Werke dieser Sammlung sind einfach entzückende Miniaturen fantastischer Natur; Charakterstücke und Canzonettas, die nur dem Namen nach Fantasien sind. Diese Werke werden von Robert Plane und Benjamin Frith meisterhaft aufgeführt.

Robert Plane, Klarinette
Benjamin Frith, Klavier

Robert Plane
Plane’s career as a solo and chamber clarinettist is rich and varied. Concerto appearances in Europe, Asia and North America have included performances of Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto in Madrid with the City of London Sinfonia, Beijing with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and in the USA with the Virginia Symphony. A champion of new music as well as the classics, Rob is equally at home performing Christian Jost’s concerto ‘Heart of Darkness’ with the Dortmunder Philharmoniker and Simon Holt’s ‘Centauromachy’ at the 2011 BBC Proms as playing Finzi with the Zurich Chamber Orchestra, Stanford with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and Copland with the London Mozart Players. He has given the world premieres of concertos by Judith Bingham, Diana Burrell, Piers Hellawell and Mark Boden.

Rob has tirelessly pursued a particular passion for British clarinet music in concert and on disc, his Gramophone Award-winning account of Finzi’s Concerto and Gramophone Award-shortlisted Bax Sonatas being just two of a large collection of recordings of works by the great English Romantics. He has performed and recorded with the Gould Piano Trio for thirty years, and their recording of Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time to mark the composer’s centenary was hailed by BBC Music Magazine as the ‘finest modern recording’ of this epic masterpiece. He also appears on the Goulds’ recorded cycles of Beethoven and Brahms Trios. They commissioned Huw Watkins to compose ‘Four Fables’ in 2018, in celebration of the twentieth anniversary of the Corbridge Chamber Music Festival which they direct together in Northumberland.

Rob has explored the clarinet quintet repertoire with a number of the finest string quartets, opening BBC Radio 3’s ‘Brahms Experience’ with a live broadcast from St. George’s Bristol of the Brahms Quintet with the Skampa Quartet. He enjoys a close relationship with the Elias String Quartet, making his debut at the 2023 Schubertiade Schwarzenberg with them in Brahms, and joining them at the Wigmore Hall for Brahms and Bliss. They gave the premiere of Judith Bingham’s new clarinet quintet ‘Elsewhere’ at the 2024 Three Choirs Festival. He has given concerts in Germany and the USA with the Mandelring Quartet and at home in the UK with, amongst others, the Marmen, Castalian, Heath, Maggini, Brodsky, Carducci, Sacconi and Callino Quartets.

Rob is clarinettist of Ensemble 360 and enjoys exploring chamber music of all kinds with them at their home in the Crucible, Sheffield and country-wide. He is also a member of Trio Meister Raro alongside violist Rachel Roberts and pianist Tim Horton, performing a selection of acknowledged masterpieces and fascinating curiosities, with a particular focus on themes of storytelling and fantasy.

Rob has enjoyed a thirty-year long relationship with the Royal Over-Seas League since winning the competition’s Gold Medal in 1992, highlights of which have included a recital tour of New Zealand and a gala performance of Bruch’s Double Concerto with the Symphony Orchestra of Sri Lanka in Colombo as part of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting.

Always keen to take on a challenge, Rob gave his first performance of Boulez’s epic ‘Dialogue de l’ombre double’ at the Belfast Sonorities Festival in 2018, a work he subsequently revived in Manchester’s Stoller Hall in 2019 and at Cardiff’s WhirlWinds Festival in 2022. Cross-discipline collaborations have included performances with leading South Asian dance specialist Mayuri Boonham. His delving into unjustly neglected works has unearthed concertos by Iain Hamilton, Ruth Gipps and Richard Walthew, which he subsequently recorded at Glasgow City Halls with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and Martyn Brabbins. The resulting disc, ‘Reawakened’, was released in July 2020 by Champs Hill Records.

In February 2023 Rob released a disc of chamber music by Pamela Harrison (the subject of an ongoing research project) on Resonus Classics with the Gould Piano Trio and other collaborators, which was given a special feature in Clarinet & Saxophone Magazine and selected as one of Gramophone Magazine’s “best new classical albums”. His recent solo album ‘Isotonic’ was released in July 2023, also on Resonus, and features four of his commissions from the past twenty-five years, including the clarinet concertos of Diana Burrell and Mark David Boden, recorded with the BBC Philharmonic. Releases in 2024 included ‘Pierrot Portraits’ with Ensemble 360 and soprano Claire Booth (“a Pierrot to cherish”) as well as a second volume of the chamber music and songs of Pamela Harrison.

Rob was principal clarinet of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales for over twenty years and has held the same position with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Royal Northern Sinfonia. In a distinguished orchestral career, he has performed as guest principal clarinet with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam, London Symphony Orchestra and in Aurora Orchestra’s performances of Brahms Symphony no. 1 from memory. He was invited by composer James Newton Howard to be solo clarinettist for the score to the Disney film Maleficent. A respected teacher and educator, he holds the post of Head of Woodwind Performance at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama.

Benjamin Frith
was encouraged by his teacher, Dame Fanny Waterman, to pursue a musical career after winning the Dudley National Concerto Competition aged fourteen. Since then, he has been a first prizewinner in the Rubinstein Piano Masters Competition where he was also awarded the special prize for chamber music, and was awarded top prize in the Busoni International Piano Competition.

Having achieved rave reviews from his American and Edinburgh Festival debuts, Frith established himself as an international concert artist. He has given recitals and concerto performances throughout Europe, Northern America, India, Kazakhstan and the Far East. He has appeared with many of the world's finest orchestras including the Berlin Symphony, Israel Philharmonic, Warsaw Philharmonic, Halle, the BBC orchestras, C.B.S.O, Northern Sinfonia, Royal Philharmonic and with such conductors as Zubin Mehta, Antoni Wit, Vasary, Skrowaczewski, Bamert, Atzmon, Noseda and Sir Mark Elder.

His exciting and diverse repertoire ranges from Scarlatti to James Macmillan and includes over fifty concertos. Much praise has been bestowed on Frith’s recordings. Piano Concertos numbers five and six by John Field reached the top of the classical charts and his five disc cycle of Mendelssohn piano works received the Penguin CD Guide Rosette Award. His disc of Schumann's Davidsbundlertanze was chosen as the top recommendation on the Radio 3 programme "Building a Library” and his acclaimed recording of Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations has now been reissued on the Resonance label. Richard Osbourne, critic of Gramophone, commented that "…that there has not been a finer Diabelli on record by a young pianist since the classic 1968 Phillips recording by the twenty eight year old Stephen Kovacevich."

Frith's enjoyment of chamber music has been fulfilled through his performances and recordings as pianist in the Gould Piano Trio plus the formation of his own Piano Quartet. His interest in the romantic English repertoire has produced fine accounts of Stanford’s trios and a reconstructed piano quartet in C minor together with works by Ireland, Bridge, Scott and Bax – nominated for a Gramophone award.

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