Davide Bandieri

Davide Bandieri, Matteo Fossi, Quartetto Savinio – Weber: Complete Chamber Music for Clarinet (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 01:04:00 minutes | 593 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Brilliant Classics

Carl Maria von Weber had a special fondness for the clarinet, finding it the ideal instrument for expressing the profound Romanticism he had made his own.

He borrowed from a youthful composition, his opera Silvana completed at the age of 24, for his Opus 33 Clarinet Variations. Encouraged by critics to rework the opera’s “overly instrumental” vocal parts, he deleted two arias, but the following year reused the melody of the second of these for his Seven Variations for Clarinet and Piano, Op. 33 (1811). He develops the instantly hummable theme with its cheerful dotted rhythm stylishly, imaginatively and virtuosically, showcasing the full extent of the clarinettist’s abilities while also allowing the piano to shine in two of the seven variations. The piece was premiered in Prague at a private residence by Weber and his friend and touring partner Heinrich Bärmann, whom he had met a few months earlier in Darmstadt. The clarinettist Bärmann had instantly won Weber over with his prodigious technique and highly expressive sound.
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