Notes for: July 27, 2010
Compared with most other instruments in common use in western music, the clarinet was a late bloomer. It was developed from a simple single-reed instrument called the chalumeau at the start of the 18th century – 200 years after the birth of the violin -- and it took another 70 to 80 years to win acceptance for more than casual use. It offered beauty of tone, but in comparison with the contemporaneous flute and oboe, it suffered from serious and unpredictable deficiencies of intonation, particularly in its lower register.
In the last quarter of the 18th century, the instrument finally came into its own as a result of several more or less simultaneous developments. First, a series of technical improvements brought its deficiencies under control. Second, Mozart, in his Clarinet Quintet and Clarinet Concerto, revealed to his fellow composers the instrument’s musical possibilities. Third, there was a flowering of clarinet virtuosos in several parts of Europe, comparable to the flowering of violin virtuosos in Italy and France a century and a half earlier.
One such virtuoso was Bernhard Henrik Crusell, the son of a Finnish carpenter, who became the leading musician of Sweden. Crusell learned the instrument as a child, and at twelve years of age his playing attracted the attention of a Swedish military post near his home (Finland was then ruled by Sweden). The commandant was so impressed that he made the boy a member of the regimental band, and when recalled to Stockholm four years later, he took the young musician with him. In Stockholm, Crusell rose through a series of posts to become the first clarinetist in the royal court orchestra, director of the royal military band, and the most famous instrumentalist in Sweden.
Crusell did not turn to composition, however, until 1803 when he was invited by the French Minister to Sweden to accompany the Minister on a visit to Paris. Stimulated by Parisian musical life and subsequent visits to Berlin and Leipzig, Crusell turned out a small stream of compositions, many of them for his own performance on the clarinet. In addition, he wrote an opera Lilla Slafyinna and a number of choral and solo songs, which are still frequently performed in Sweden and Finland.
The Quartet in E Flat, a product of that transitional year of 1803, was the first of three works that Crusell wrote for solo clarinet, violin, viola and cello. While not profound or daring music, the quartet reveals a fresh and melodious style, and exhibits Crusell’s extraordinary mastery of his instrument.
The quartet is in the usual four movements of classical chamber music. The first movement, in sonata form, opens with a thoughtful adagio introduction for the strings only. A descending chromatic passage leads to the first theme, presented by the clarinet. A repeat of that passage leads to the second theme, again presented by the clarinet. The passage reappears in the development.
The second movement is captioned “Romanza,” a term also used by Mozart, Beethoven and Romantic composers for an instrumental or vocal composition that is lyrical in character and tender or even sentimental in mood. The movement is in three sections, the first featuring the clarinet; the second, the violin; and the third a return to the first.
The third movement is the customary minuet with a contrasting trio. The finale is a rondo, with an animated refrain repeated after two contrasting episodes. The first episode again spotlights the clarinet, and the second, the strings alone and then the clarinet. The clarinet winds things up with a rapid run.