Charles Harford Lloyd: Chamber Music for Clarinet
Charles Harford Lloyd (1849–1919) – organist of Gloucester Cathedral and the Chapel Royal, Oxford theologian and concert-organiser, music master at Eton and much more – was one of the most distinguished musicians of Victorian England. The largest part of his output is vocal music, mostly for the church; he composed only a handful of chamber works, often involving the clarinet. He wrote in a light Romantic idiom, where the influence of Brahms is often audible, as with his close friend, Hubert Parry. Lloyd knew how to make the clarinet sing, with one lovely, long-limbed melody after another. This first-ever album of his chamber music rescues a long-forgotten figure from the shadows.
Matthew Nelson, clarinet
Alexander Volpov, cello
Chad Sloan, baritone
Anna Petrova, piano
Listen To This Recording:
Trio for Clarinet, Cello and Piano in B-Flat Major (c. 1900)** (20:41)
- I. Allegro con brio (8:03)
- II. Andante espressivo (8:04)
- III. Allegro moderato (4:34)
- Duo Concertante (1886) (6:24)
- Annette (1886) (3:47)
Suite in the Old Style (1914)* (11:47)
- I. Prelude (1:46)
- II. Allemande (1:25)
- III. Minuet (3:11)
- IV. Sarabande (3:34)
- V. Gigue (1:51)
- Le Départ (publ. 1920) (2:20)
Three Little Pieces (1919)* (5:34)
- I. Romance (2:07)
- II. A Simple Melody (1:41)
- III. Valse Mignonne (1:46)
- Idyll (1912)* (4:08)
- ‘Bon Voyage!’ (1887) (2:34)
*First Recording
**First Recording in this Version
BBC Music Magazine :
‘Opening the album is a new version of the B flat major Trio for clarinet, bassoon and the piano, with the bassoon part adopted for cello. Nelson, Petrova and Volpov established this new instrumentation as a worthy companion piece to Brahms’s more well-known offering. […]
Detailed and well-researched booklet notes by Nelson generously contextualized Llyod’s clarinet music, making this a welcome release for players and listeners alike.’
—Ingrid Pearson, BBC Music Magazine
MusicWeb International :
‘Given his proficiency in choral music, I wasn’t necessarily expecting a similar level of expertise in this Trio but that’s what we get. It’s a 21-minute, three movement work rooted to a degree in the precedent of Brahms but showing a deft songfulness and attractive density of sound. […] This is welcome discovery heard in its premiere performance in this version. […]
The Duo Concertante is an earlier piece from 1886 and sports a fine array of tunes, deployed well – the performers here are attentive to dynamics – and the result is clever, clear and singable. […]
The performers, as noted, prove adept exponents of these late-Victorian and Edwardian pieces. […]
Toccata’s booklet notes are, as ever, admirably full both as to the details of Lloyd’s life and the nature of the chamber works performed.
—Jonathan Woolf, MusicWeb International