The pandemic has compelled artists to find new ways of channelling their creativity. Portuguese clarinettist Rui Travasso turned the experience of isolation into something positive with his lockdown recording of solo clarinet music, an extraordinary and powerful achievement.
The album features a range of relatively recent repertoire. French composer Henri Tomasi’s Sonatine Attique is said to have been inspired by a night under the Greek stars near the Parthenon in Athens. The clarinet’s agile, jovial side is contrasted with sinuous, haunting passages. We hear a finely-crafted Sonata for Clarinet Solo by Dutch composer Rudolf Escher, who was influenced by the music of Debussy, Ravel and Mahler, and the apparently effortless Monolog No. 3 by Swedish composer Erland von Koch, who was influenced by Bartók, Sibelius, Grieg and Hindemith.
There are more overt tributes to other composers, too: Gordon Jacob, Béla Kóvacs, Henrik Ødegaard, Sérgio Azevedo and Giovanni Mattaliano.
