Beethoven, Brahms and a clarinet: Cheng² Duo and James Campbell at the Alix Goolden
A cello and a piano make one of the most familiar pairings in chamber music. Add a clarinet and the sound changes completely: darker, warmer, closer to three voices talking than to a soloist with accompaniment. The repertoire for that combination is small, and it is anchored by two works, one by Beethoven and one by Brahms.
Both are on the programme on Saturday, October 24, when the Cheng² Duo and clarinetist James Campbell open the Victoria Conservatory of Music's season at the Alix Goolden Performance Hall.
Three players, two generations
Cheng² (pronounced "Cheng Squared") is cellist Bryan Cheng and pianist Silvie Cheng, siblings who have been playing together since childhood. They made the duo official with a debut at Carnegie's Weill Recital Hall in 2011 and have since toured the Americas, Europe, Asia and South Africa. Their most recent album, Portrait, was nominated for a 2024 JUNO Award. Bryan is the only cellist in 40 years to take prizes at both the Queen Elisabeth and Geneva international competitions.
James Campbell has been at this rather longer. He has played in 30 countries and appeared as soloist with more than 60 orchestras, and he performed Copland's Clarinet Concerto four times with Copland himself conducting. He holds a JUNO and the Order of Canada, and has directed Ontario's Festival of the Sound since 1985.
Mhiran Faraday, the Conservatory's Director of Events & Partnerships, has worked with the Chengs for nearly ten years. She says she is "in awe" of their musicianship and of how they tell a story from the stage.
What you'll hear
The evening opens with Beethoven's Trio in B-flat major, Op. 11, written when he was in his late twenties. It is bright, quick-witted music, and its finale is a set of variations on a hit opera tune of the day. Vienna was whistling it in the streets, which is how the trio got its nickname, the "Gassenhauer".
Paul Juon's Trio Miniatures follows: four short character pieces by a Russian-born Swiss composer who deserves to be heard more often.
After intermission the trio splits into pairs. Campbell and Silvie Cheng play Graham Campbell's Wood and Wire for clarinet and piano. Then the Chengs take the stage alone for Joaquín Nin's Seguida Española, four movements each named for a region of Spain.
All three return for the Brahms Clarinet Trio in A minor, Op. 114. Brahms had announced his retirement when he heard the clarinetist Richard Mühlfeld play, and promptly changed his mind. The trio is one of four late works he wrote for Mühlfeld, and it is as autumnal as anything he composed. It is a fitting piece for a late October night.
