Clarinettist Bernhard Röthlisberger and pianist Benjamin Engeli return to the Musiques Suisses label and are joined by violinist Fióna Kraege and cellist Milena Umiglia, in...

Clarinettist Bernhard Röthlisberger and pianist Benjamin Engeli return to the Musiques Suisses label and are joined by violinist Fióna Kraege and cellist Milena Umiglia, in an album of mostly world premiere recordings. The artists write: “The genesis of the present album is closely linked to that of the Swiss Clarinet Music album (Musiques Suisses NXMS 7002) that we recorded in the summer of 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic, as a reaction to the lockdown. Further scores had come to light in the course of researching that project, which have hitherto been largely ignored. Five of these works, by Johann Carl Eschmann, Paul Juon, Richard Flury and Paul Müller-Zürich, are brought together here. What they all have in common, regardless of the dates of composition, which span a century, is that their musical idiom is deeply rooted in Romanticism and late Romanticism.”

REVIEW:

All of the works here share a musical idiom that is deeply rooted in Romanticism. The surprising harmonic turns of Eschmann's pieces are reminiscent of Schumann and Mendelssohn, while Juon (the trio is from 1901) has been described as "the missing link between Tchaikovsky and Stravinsky". Flury's trio was written in 1950 to mark the 25th anniversary of Radio Bern, and Müller-Zürich, one of the most significant figures in Swiss 20th-century mystical life, demonstrates the utmost technical refinement in his 1937 quartet.

-- Records International