Anthony McGill & Gloria Chien: Clarinet Tours de Force

Clarinetist Anthony McGill is one of classical music’s most recognizable and brilliantly multifaceted figures. He maintains a dynamic international solo and chamber music career in addition to being the principal clarinet of the New York Philharmonic. McGill performed at President Obama’s inauguration in 2009 and is a champion of social justice in the classical music world. McGill and Chamber Music Northwest’s new Co-Artistic Director Gloria Chien will continue their longstanding collaboration with this performance from the stunning Mechanics Hall in Worcester, MA.

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Program

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BRAHMS Clarinet Sonata No. 2 in E-flat Major, Op. 120, No. 2

JESSIE MONTGOMERY Peace (2020)

JESSIE MONTGOMERY (b.1981) Peace (2020)

Peace (2020) by Jessie Montgomery, used by permission.

BRAHMS Clarinet Sonata in F Minor, Op. 120, No. 1

JOHANNES BRAHMS (1833-1897)
Clarinet Sonata in F Minor, Op. 120, No. 1 (24’)

I.  Allegro appassionato
II.  Andante un poco adagio
III. Allegretto grazioso
IV.  Vivace

In the winter of 1891, Johannes Brahms was on the verge of retiring from composition. He was unwell, depressed, and suffering from writer’s block. A visit to the court of Meiningen a few months later changed everything; there Brahms met virtuoso clarinetist Richard Mühlfeld, who played in the court orchestra. Mühlfeld’s artistry, and the rich expressive sound of the clarinet itself, reanimated Brahms, who went on to compose several significant chamber works, all featuring the clarinet.

In 1894, Brahms once again reached a low creative point, and once again Mühlfeld and his clarinet came to Brahms’ rescue. While vacationing in Bad Ischl that summer, Brahms composed the two clarinet sonatas of Op. 120. Biographer Karl Geiringer wrote of the “wonderful exploitation of the possibilities of the clarinet, especially in the effective change from the higher to the lower registers…a tender melancholy…and a splendid perfection of form in all the movements.”

The Clarinet Sonata in F minor’s four movements contrast the introspection and wistfulness of the first two movements with exuberance and lighthearted whimsy in the final two; by the closing Vivace the mood is so transformed as to end in a sunny F major rather than the brooding echoes of the original F minor tonality.

Brahms recognized Mühlfeld’s central role when he included the following dedication in the published score of Op. 120: “To Richard Mühlfeld, the master of his beautiful instrument, in sincerely grateful remembrance.”

—© Elizabeth Schwartz

WEBER Grand Duo Concertant, Op. 48

Click here for Program Notes

In 1890, at the age of 57, Johannes Brahms announced his retirement from writing music. As he later put it, “I’m really too old. . . I had achieved enough; here I had before me a carefree old age and could enjoy it in peace.”

As it turned out, life had different plans. The following year, Brahms paid a fateful visit to a small central-German court called Meiningen, where he met a clarinetist named Richard Mühlfeld. Throughout his stay in Meiningen, Brahms found himself captivated by the tone Mühlfeld could create with his clarinet, almost like the sound of a human voice. Soon Brahms was calling Mühlfeld nicknames like “my dear nightingale” and “my prima donna”; it was clear he had found a new muse.

That summer, Brahms returned to his summer home in Austria, where he emerged from his short-lived retirement to create two late masterpieces, his Clarinet Quintet and Clarinet Trio in A Minor. A few years later, he followed these gems up with two additional gifts for Mühlfeld (and clarinetists ever since), the Opus 120 clarinet sonatas. Together, these sonatas represent the first major contribution to the clarinet sonata repertoire, as well as the final chamber music Johannes Brahms would ever compose.

Like many of Brahms’ post-retirement works, the Clarinet Sonata No. 2 in E-flat Major is lyrical and contemplative, with a sense of melancholy that extends between its three movements. The second movement, Allegro, molto appassionato, explores one of Brahms’ most memorable and operatic melodies, given all the more emotional impact due to the sonorous, voice-like tone quality of the clarinet. Never rushing to a new idea, Brahms lingers and savors each moment to its fullest throughout. Even the sonata’s comparatively flashy finale begins with a lengthy, meditative Andante con moto section, but Brahms allows both the clarinetist and pianist a chance to show off in the free-flowing Allegro section that brings it to its conclusion.

The Clarinet Sonata No. 1 in F Minor, while still introspective in its own way, has a bit more of the verve, angularity, and gravity that epitomized Brahms’ music prior to his retirement. Its four movements contain great variety, from the first movement’s stern opening salvo to the leisurely second movement and the graceful, earnest third. The Vivace finale, on the other hand, is Brahms at his most lighthearted. Echoes of this witty and humorous music can be heard in many clarinet sonatas written by composers in the 20th century, including notably those of Paul Hindemith and Francis Poulenc.

Brahms’ choice of F Minor and E-flat Major as the keys for his sonatas may have been a subtle nod to another composer who played an important role in the history of the clarinet, Carl Maria von Weber (1786–1826). One of the first composers of the Romantic Era in Germany, Weber shot to fame in 1821 with a major opera called Der Freischütz (The Marksman). Another important moment in his early career, however, came in 1811, when Weber struck a friendship with a Munich clarinetist named Heinrich Baermann.

In many ways, Weber’s connection with Baermann directly parallels Brahms’ later bond with Mühlfeld. The two became fast friends and artistic collaborators from the start. In fact, almost immediately after meeting Baermann, Weber set to work at composing two new concertos for Baermann to perform – one in E-flat Major and the other in F Minor.

When Weber visited Munich in 1815, he once again jumped at the opportunity to write for his clarinet-playing muse, this time embarking on a project to write a sonata for clarinet and piano that he and Baermann could perform together. Once he finished the piece, however, Weber decided that it was not a sonata at all, but rather a more dramatic-sounding Grand Duo Concertant for Clarinet and Piano.

The use of the word “Concertant” in the title suggests that Weber may have viewed this duo as a chamber music equivalent of the orchestral concerto. Although the piano plays the role of the orchestra in this case, both performers have abundant opportunities to display their virtuosity. Weber’s characteristic operatic flair, which would be realized more fully in Der Freichütz, comes through clearly in the opening Allegro con fuoco’s playful, conversational exchanges between clarinet and piano. The Andante second movement takes on a grim, melancholic tone, while the winding passages and trills of the rondo finale, which Weber actually composed first, suggest that Baermann, like Mühlfeld, must have been a truly remarkable clarinetist.

– Ethan Allred

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Artists

Anthony McGill Clarinet

Hailed for his “trademark brilliance, penetrating sound, and rich character” (The New York Times), clarinetist Anthony McGill enjoys a dynamic international solo and chamber music career and is principal clarinet of the New York Philharmonic—the first African American principal player in the organization’s history. He is the recipient of the 2020 Avery Fisher Prize, one of classical music’s most significant awards.

McGill appears as a soloist with top orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, Metropolitan Opera, and the Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, and Detroit Symphony Orchestras. He performed alongside Itzhak Perlman, Yo-Yo Ma, and Gabriela Montero at the inauguration of President Barack Obama, premiering a piece by John Williams. As a chamber musician, McGill is a collaborator of the Brentano, Daedalus, Guarneri, JACK, Miró, Pacifica, Shanghai, Takács, and Tokyo Quartets, and performs with leading artists including Emanuel Ax, Inon Barnatan, Gloria Chien, Yefim Bronfman, Gil Shaham, Midori, Mitsuko Uchida, and Lang Lang.

He serves on the faculty of The Juilliard School and is the Artistic Director for Juilliard’s Music Advancement Program. He holds the William R. and Hyunah Yu Brody Distinguished Chair at the Curtis Institute of Music. In 2020, McGill’s #TakeTwoKnees campaign protesting the death of George Floyd and historic racial injustice went viral.

Artist's Website

Gloria Chien Piano & Artistic Director

Taiwanese-born pianist Gloria Chien has one of the most diverse musical lives as a noted performer, concert presenter, and educator. She made her orchestral debut at the age of sixteen with the Boston Symphony Orchestra with Thomas Dausgaard, and she performed again with the BSO with Keith Lockhart. She was subsequently selected by The Boston Globe as one of its Superior Pianists of the year, “who appears to excel in everything.” In recent seasons, she has performed as a recitalist and chamber musician at Alice Tully Hall, the Library of Congress, the Phillips Collection, the Dresden Chamber Music Festival, and the National Concert Hall in Taiwan. She performs frequently with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.

In 2009, she launched String Theory, a chamber music series in Chattanooga, Tennessee that has become one of the region’s premier classical music presenters.  The following year she was appointed Director of the Chamber Music Institute at Music@Menlo. In 2017, she joined her husband, violinist Soovin Kim, as Artistic Director of the Lake Champlain Chamber Music Festival in Burlington, Vermont. The duo became Artistic Directors at Chamber Music Northwest in Portland, Oregon in 2020. Chien studied extensively at the New England Conservatory of Music with Wha Kyung Byun and Russell Sherman. She, with Kim, were awarded Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s 2021 CMS Award for Extraordinary Service to Chamber Music.

Chien is Artist-in-Residence at Lee University in Cleveland, Tennessee, and she is a Steinway Artist. Chien received her B.M., M.M., and D.M.A. degrees from the New England Conservatory of Music as a student of Russell Sherman and Wha-Kyung Byun.

Artist's Website

Upcoming Concerts & Events

• Chien-Kim-Watkins Trio: Beethoven’s Complete Piano Trios “Dawn of a New Age”
• Chien-Kim-Watkins Trio: Beethoven’s Complete Piano Trios “Breaking Boundaries”
• Chien-Kim-Watkins Trio: Beethoven’s Complete Piano Trios “Triumph & Transcendence”
• EXCLUSIVE DONOR CONCERT: Emerson Quartet Farewell with Gloria Chien

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