Aparté to Release New Clarinet Trio Album

Cover of the album being discussed, showing Patrick Messina, Lise Berthaud, and Fabrizio Chiovetta

Having played first clarinet in a community orchestra prior to beginning my freshman year at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, I have had a soft spot for clarinet chamber music for many decades. Thus, when I learned that Aparté would be releasing a new album of two selections from that repertoire one week from today, I found it almost impossible to resist. The clarinetist on that album is Patrick Messina, performing two trios with violist Lise Berthaud and Fabrizio Chiovetta on piano; and the title of the album is simply Mozart & Bruch.

Most of the album is devoted to Max Bruch’s Opus 83, a set of eight pieces composed for those three instruments. The remaining three tracks present Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 498 trio in E-flat major, given the name “Kegelstatt.” For those unfamiliar with the name, it means “a place where skittles are played,” a predecessor of the contemporary bowling alley. Mind you, the music has nothing to do with a large ball knocking over an array of pins; but biographical evidence suggests that the music was conceived while the composer was playing skittles. Sadly, opportunities for listening to this music in recital tend to be rare; and, according to my archives, the most recent encounter involved one of pianist Ian Scarfe’s chamber music recitals in October of 2017.

The Bruch trio, on the other hand, is likely to be a “journey of discovery” for most listeners. The composer tends to be best known for his concertante music, and his catalog of chamber music is relatively modest. Opus 83 was composed late in his life (1910); and it is his only work in that genre involving an instrument other than piano and strings. Nevertheless, the music displays a keen sense of balance among the three instruments; and the rhetoric is as expressive as his orchestral compositions, such as the works for violin or cello and orchestra. The three musicians on this album capture the spirit of this relatively unfamiliar composition with a journey that is definitely well worth taking.