Brahms: 3 Sonatas Michael Collins & Stephen Hough

• Johannes Brahms (1833 - 1897): Violin Sonata No. 2 in A Major, Op. 100 "Thun" (Arr. M. Collins for Clarinet & Piano):
• 1 Brahms: Violin Sonata No. 2 in A Major, Op. 100 "Thun" (Arr. M. Collins for Clarinet & Piano): I. Allegro amabile 08:05
• 2 Brahms: Violin Sonata No. 2 in A Major, Op. 100 "Thun" (Arr. M. Collins for Clarinet & Piano): II. Andante tranquillo - Vivace 05:54
• 3 Brahms: Violin Sonata No. 2 in A Major, Op. 100 "Thun" (Arr. M. Collins for Clarinet & Piano): III. Allegretto grazioso, quasi andante 05:25
• Clarinet Sonata No. 1 in F Minor, Op. 120 No. 1:
• 4 Brahms: Clarinet Sonata No. 1 in F Minor, Op. 120 No. 1: I. Allegro appassionato 07:43
• 5 Brahms: Clarinet Sonata No. 1 in F Minor, Op. 120 No. 1: II. Andante un poco adagio 05:07
• 6 Brahms: Clarinet Sonata No. 1 in F Minor, Op. 120 No. 1: III. Allegretto grazioso 04:08
• 7 Brahms: Clarinet Sonata No. 1 in F Minor, Op. 120 No. 1: IV. Vivace 04:47
• Clarinet Sonata No. 2 in E-Flat Major, Op. 120 No. 2:
• 8 Brahms: Clarinet Sonata No. 2 in E-Flat Major, Op. 120 No. 2: I. Allegro amabile 08:27
• 9 Brahms: Clarinet Sonata No. 2 in E-Flat Major, Op. 120 No. 2: II. Allegro appassionato 05:17
• 10 Brahms: Clarinet Sonata No. 2 in E-Flat Major, Op. 120 No. 2: III. Andante con moto - Allegro 07:05
• Total Runtime 01:01:58

Info for Brahms: 3 Sonatas

Friends of long standing as well as regular partners in chamber music, Michael Collins and Stephen Hough bring their combined musical insights and expertise to bear on Johannes Brahms’s sonatas for clarinet and piano. Together with the composer’s trio for clarinet, cello and piano and clarinet quintet, the sonatas are among the most treasured works in the repertoire of the instrument – but it is partly down to good luck that we have them at all. When Brahms in 1891 heard the clarinetist Richard Mühlfeld, principal clarinet of the Meiningen Court Orchestra, he had already announced his retirement. He was enraptured by Mühlfeld’s playing and its vocal qualities, however, and made a ‘comeback’: during the following couple of years he composed all four of his clarinet works. These were written especially for Mühlfeld, whose spirit does seem to pervade the two sonatas – we hear an unusually sunny and lyrical Brahms, with plenty of opportunity to sing for both instruments. When the sonatas were published, they appeared with alternative viola parts to replace the clarinet, and soon violin versions prepared by the composer were also brought out. For the opening work on the disc, Michael Collins has therefore taken a leaf out of Brahms’s book, by adapting the composer’s Violin Sonata No. 2, another late work. The amount of adaptation needed is small: a lot of the violin writing fits the clarinet well, and the sonata share much of the songlike quality of the two ‘real’ clarinet sonatas.

Michael Collins, clarinet
Stephen Hough, piano

Michael Collins
is one of the most complete musicians of his generation. With a continuing, distinguished career as a soloist, he has in recent years also become highly regarded as a conductor and in 2010 took the position of Principal Conductor of the City of London Sinfonia. Recent guest conducting and play-directing highlights have included engagements with the Philharmonia Orchestra, Academy of St Martin in the Fields, Ulster Orchestra, and the HPAC Orchestra in Kyoto, Japan.

This season Michael will also conduct and perform wth the BBC Symphony Orchestra in a studio concert and work with the Kymi Sinfonietta and Franz Liszt Chamber Orchestra for play-direct programmes. He also and makes his debut with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg, playing and directing a programme of Mozart, Weber and Rossini. As a soloist, he will work with the Charlotte Symphony and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. Future plans include OSESP Sao Paulo, as well as a return to the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra.

Michael Collins has been committed to expanding the repertoire of the clarinet for many years. He has given premières of works such as John Adams’ Gnarly Buttons, Elliott Carter’s Clarinet Concerto - for which he won a Gramophone award for his recording on Deutsche Grammophon - Brett Dean’s Ariel’s Music and Turnage’s Riffs and Refrains, which was commissioned by the Hallé Orchestra. Collins has gone on to perform Turnage’s work with the Residentie Orkest, Royal Flanders and Helsinki Philharmonics, as well as the London Philharmonic Orchestra. Collins has received the Royal Philharmonic Society’s Instrumentalist of the Year Award in 2007 in recognition of his pivotal role in premièring repertoire by some of today’s most highly regarded composers.

In great demand as a chamber musician, Collins performs regularly with the Borodin and Takács quartets, András Schiff, Martha Argerich, Stephen Hough, Mikhail Pletnev, Lars Vogt, Joshua Bell and Steven Isserlis. His ensemble, London Winds, celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary in 2013 and the group maintains a busy diary with high calibre engagements such as the BBC Proms, Aldeburgh Festival, Edinburgh Festival, City of London Festival, Cheltenham International Festival and Bath Mozartfest. He has a regular relationship with the Wigmore Hall and was one of their Artists in Residence in 2015/16, which includes concerts with London Winds and Christine Rice, Ailish Tynan and with the Borodin Quartet – with whom he will also work at the Cite de la Musique in Paris. Collins is also Artistic Director of the Liberation International Music Festival in Jersey.

Michael Collins records exclusively for Chandos and has covered a wide range of repertoire in his prolific recording career, which also includes releases on Deutsche Grammophon, Decca, EMI and Sony. Recent releases include a disc of British Clarinet Concertos with the BBC Symphony Orchestra which features Collins as soloist and conductor, as well as a disc of Brahms and Reinicke Clarinet Sonatas with pianist Michael McHale. Collins’s 50th Birthday was celebrated with a Chandos release of Weber Concertos conducted and performed by himself with the City of London Sinfonia. He has also recorded concertos by Corigliano, Adams, Carter, as well as Spohr, Copland and of course Mozart. In the Queen’s Birthday Honours of 2015, Michael Collins was awarded an MBE for his services to music. He plays exclusively on Yamaha clarinets.

Booklet for Brahms: 3 Sonatas