orchestra21

Tomorrow night I’m mixing it up and manning the basset horn for a performance of Mozart’s incredible Gran Partita Serenade. I have a beautiful modern horn for this gig but the instrument pictured above is closer in form to the ones Mozart knew through his acquaintance with Anton Stadler. Experience the sound of a period basset in this superb recording by instrument maker and performer Gilles Thome.

[Reproduction of an 18th-century basset horn by Rudolf Tutz]

I’m fairly certain that Rahsaan Roland Kirk was the coolest cat to ever touch a clarinet.

[via souleyes]

Mozart – Fragment of a concerto for basset horn in G, K621b
Gilles Thomé and Ensemble 415
Une soirée chez les Jacquin

This one’s for the clarinet heads, many of whom have probably seen the facsimile of Mozart’s G major concerto fragment for basset horn [subsequently recast in A major as the clarinet concerto]. But I’m guessing I am not the only one hearing the fragment for the first time, presented here on a very interesting recording of Mozart works connected to the Jacquin family.

For those of you unfamiliar with the composer’s interest in the clarinet it was the playing of Anton Stadler – and his experimentation with the physical form of the then youthful instrument – that drew forth a raft of sublime wind music from Mozart for a whole range of different clarinets and basset horns, several of which are featured on this record.

Mozart – Clarinet Concerto, Adagio – mp3
WCFSO – April 2010

For your Saturday listening pleasure, a recent performance of the most sublime music ever written for the clarinet. [I am playing and conducting.] Apologies about the less than perfect sound quality – we didn’t have our normal recording set-up available for this concert.

Comment on this music at my SoundCloud.