School of Music
Review: Tara Werner
It's often been said that Mozart absolutely hated the flute, although he wrote some lovely works for the instrument.
Luckily, Johann Sebastian Bach did not share this prejudice, not only loving the flute but composing a bounty of beautiful scores for it.
Even so, an evening made up entirely of his flute sonatas could have been quite daunting.
Yet the Music Theatre was almost packed - testimony to Bach's pulling power in the 250th anniversary of his death.
The audience was richly rewarded by some fine and sensitive playing by flautists Alisa Willis and Uwe Grodd, harpsichordist James Tibbles, cellist Katrin Eickhorst-Squire and violinist Gregory Squire.
Tibbles performed with his usual rock-steady accompaniment, playing in all but one sonata.
Alisa Willis and Uwe Grodd are pupil and teacher respectively in the School of Music and were evenly matched.
Willis' playing in a solo sonata by CPE Bach highlighted her confident lyricism, and later she balanced Grodd gently in the Sonata for two flutes and continuo BWV 1039.
Here the adagio was particularly eloquent, the musicians displaying expressive accord.
Two other slow movements also impressed by their fluency: the opening adagio of the Sonata in e minor BWV 1034 and the incredibly chromatic andante of the Sonata in b minor BWV 1030.
Grodd made easy work of these two difficult pieces, although in the latter, the syncopation in the presto became slightly unstuck.
The intellectual giant in the programme was the Trio Sonata from The Musical Offering BWV 1079, Bach reworking a melody given to him by Frederick the Great to tremendous lengths.
Violinist Gregory Squire joined the others to present a workmanlike if not exactly inspired account of this contrapuntal tour-de-force.
<i>Performance:</i> Bach's Flute
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