Music / “All that Glitters”, CSO Chamber Classics. At Albert Hall, October 29. Reviewed by GRAHAM McDONALD.

THE Canberra Symphony Orchestra continues with its series of colour-themed concerts, this one obscurely around gold, with CSO artistic director and chief conductor Jessica Cottis suggesting that there is “gold” in the music performed by the CSO wind soloists. 

Whatever the rationale, this concert consisted of three pieces of chamber music from across 130 years with some fine playing from five of the CSO wind players with the ever-delightful addition of Edward Neeman on piano.

The wind players were Kiri Sollis, flute; Megan Pampling, oboe; Alan Vivian, clarinet; Ben Hoadley, bassoon and Robert Johnson, French horn. In various combinations they worked their way through an early Beethoven trio, some short works of incidental theatre music from 1930 by French composer Jacques Ibert and a mid-19th century piano and wind sextet by a French female composer Louise Ferrenc.

The Beethoven “Trio in B-flat major, op11” was published in 1798 so that it could be played by violin and cello or clarinet and bassoon (or combinations thereof) to maximise possible sales for the young composer. The clarinet and bassoon combination was certainly effective, though the bassoon does lack the presence of a cello in the combination. This is not to suggest there was anything lacking in the performance, all three played excellently, it’s just that the tonality of the bassoon gets a little lost.

All five wind players combined for the “Trois Pieces Breves” by Ibert, which were most enjoyable and entirely too brief, before Neeman joined them for Ferrenc’s “Sextet for Piano and Winds in C minor, op 40”. 

It was a most pleasurable half hour of music with the melodies being handed back and forth between the flute, oboe and clarinet, the horn and bassoon adding the lower register with Neeman’s piano dancing around the melodic themes. 

This was a most interestingly programmed and skilfully executed concert, showcasing the depth of musical talent we have in this city.