THE SUNDAY TIMES:
Eight works by a composer whose craftsmanship is as fastidious as his imagination is spirited. Strictly speaking, seven: for Après un silence, whose title alludes to Fauré, but indicates the breaking of a year-long creative silence, is heard as a piece for violin (Lesley Hatfield) and piano, and in Casken’s large-ensemble version. The soloist in the latter is Kyra Humphreys, and Clark Rundell conducts the RNCM Ensemble. Frenchness of idiom pervades the eloquent cor anglais concertino Infanta Marina, written for the Nash Ensemble and here performed by Ensemble 10/10 under Rundell, with the soloist Rachael Pankhurst. Firewhirl, for soprano (Patricia Rozario) and ensemble, is a folk-inflected depiction of Finnish midsummer revels.
Paul Driver
THE GUARDIAN:
This useful survey of pieces by John Casken, all but one of them appearing on disc for the first time, covers more than 20 years of his development as a composer. The earliest scores - the 1978 ensemble piece Amarantos, the highly charged Firewhirl, a 1980 setting of a George Macbeth poem, and the busy two-piano Salamandra from 1986 - show Casken still sorting his influences. The later music - Infanta Marina from 1994, Distant Variations for saxophone quartet and wind band (1996), and the two versions (for solo violin with piano and ensemble accompaniments) of Après un Silence (1998), show more cool craftsmanship and less vivid invention though, as these performances show, the understanding of instrumental capabilities is totally assured.
Andrew Clements
MUSICAL POINTERS:
Here is another useful compendium of music by Manchester based composer and teacher John Casken (b.1949), covering some 20 years of his compositional life. He is an adaptable composer, well represented on CD, whose idiom is accessible-modernist. Each of these eight works is c. a quarter of an hour in duration. Most of the music has literary or dramatic triggers, more relevant perhaps to the composer himself than always to listeners? Of interest also, is that Casken is a painter and provides his own cover illustration. It is good to have the two versions of Après un silence, to give insight into how he works. I was especially glad to hear again the two-piano Salamandra, which I remember vividly from an early performance in 1986 by the same artists who have joined forces again to record it. The Piano Quartet was a Domus commission, an opportunity to remind readers about my best musical read last year, Beyond the Notes by Susan Tomes. Firewhirl sets a George Macbeth poem about revels in Finland; the words are impossible to follow (always difficult with high-lying soprano lines) and the text is not supplied; the six pages of biography could have been shortened to make room for the poem? The recordings (1992 & 1993 in Manchester) are good and the production is of Metier's usual high standard. We thought the cover picture was shown upside-down, but the composer/painter disagrees!
Peter Grahame Woolf
LIVERPOOL DAILY POST:
I mentioned recently a CD of music by Gary Carpenter, played by Ensemble 10/10. They also play music by Manchester University-based John Casken, ona disc from Metier, on which Clark Rundell conducts. Infanta Maria has Rachel Pankhurst, the cor anglais soloist. Soprano Patricia Rozaric is soprano in Firewhirl and there’s Amarantos for small ensemble. Psappha plays the Piano Quartet. There is Balamandra, a Fire Haunt for two pianos played by Andrew Ball and Julian Jacobson, and RNCM groups play Distant Variations for saxophone quartet and ensemble, and Apres un Silence is heard in violin and piano and ensemble versions. This approachable music is well played on this 2CD set.
Peter Spaull
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