Donna Voce Volume 3
Anna Shelest (piano)
Dmitri Shelest (piano duet)
Estonian National Symphony Orchestra/Neeme Järvi
rec. 2023/24, Estonia Concert Hall, Tallinn; Crossway Studio, Mendham, USA
Music & Arts MA-1310 [76]

It doesn’t seem two minutes since I was reviewing volume two of Anna Shelest’s highly enjoyable Donna Voce series (Music & Arts MA-1309 review) and now volume three is in my hands. Two composers this time, Clara Schumann who is becoming more familiar as pianists and recording companies take up her music and Cécile Chaminade who is know for a small handful of pieces but whose large output is far from being properly represented on disc. I like the format that Shelest has chosen, a piano concertante work by each composer followed by short solo items and additionally, in the case of Chaminade, her six romantic pieces for piano duet.

It is good to see that Clara Schumann’s piano concerto is appearing more and more, at least on disc and with young performers at the piano. Isata Kanneh-Mason and Danny Driver have both set it down and I have a live recording by Italian pianist Vanessa Bonelli Mosell; I can now give this new disc a hearty welcome. In a sense it is a remarkable work, partly because Clara was just fourteen when she started it, intending it as a single movement Concertstück. She was only just turned sixteen when she premiered the concerto, now in its current three movement form, with Felix Mendelssohn on the podium. The finale is longer than the first two movements combined and was the original concert piece that she played at the Gewandhaus in 1834, again under Mendelssohn. The opening allegro maestoso, is short at just under six minutes, and is similar in vein to concerto allegros by the likes of Hummel or Kalkbrenner, the fashionable composers of the age that Clara would be playing and offers the usual formula of lyrical passages interspersed with technically challenging passagework. A relatively unusual move is to connect the three movements, much as Mendelssohn’s G minor concerto does and even more unusually, the romance, a beautiful movement, features just piano and solo cello. The fireworks recommence in the finale and it all sounds as natural as can be and ably demonstrates the command of the instrument that her father’s stern regime had afforded her. I was reminded of moments in Chopin’s E minor concerto at times, most especially in the lyrical passages which have some of his style and harmonic turns. Ms Shelest’s spectacular performance was recorded live and we hear a little of the audience’s enthusiastic response. The Chaminade Concertstück was recorded the same day but without audience applause it is difficult to tell if it was recorded in the same concert.

Eight years on and Clara was married to Robert and the days of performing the note-spinning music of Kalkbrenner, Pixis and Herz were behind her. Her music has more maturity and the four fleeting pieces are a fine example of that. The burdens of motherhood and Robert’s need for a quiet household in which to compose Clara would indeed have had to snatch every fleeting moment for her own creative endeavours. They comprise a lyrical song without words in F major that shows off her melodic gifts, a busy, bustling piece in triple time with staccato notes and chords peppered throughout, an andante that is the closest thing to her husband’s work that I think I’ve come across and a Schubertian scherzo that was actually written earlier as the third movement of the G minor Sonata. The impromptu in E appears to have been written at roughly the same time but was only eventually published in 1885 alongside unpublished works of Liszt, Saint-Saëns and Chaminade in a collection entitled Album du Galois. It is full of finely crafted arpeggio figures that swirl in a bewildering pattern, very elegantly played by Shelest.

By the time Cécile Chaminade was born Clara had all but stopped composing though she lived for nearly four more decades. Chaminade’s father deemed it improper for a young lady to enter the conservatoire so its teachers came to her, Joseph Le Couppey and Benjamin Godard among them. The lack of any formal qualification may have hindered her career as the booklet suggests but she went on to fame that others, clutching their qualifications, could only dream of; a successful concert career built entirely on her own compositions, honours and acclaim from the great and the good as well as a kind of fanbase that produced several hundred Chaminade clubs across America. She also had a box of chocolates named after her AND appeared on a collectible cigarette card. She played her Concertstück in Paris in 1889 and considered the success she achieved with it to signal the start of her career. I am glad that more recordings are appearing as it is a highly enjoyable piece with the Wagnerian drama of its orchestral opening giving way to Gallic humour and a piano part that  features everything from dazzling arpeggios and octaves to delicate filigree passage work and beautiful melodies. There is something of Saint-Saëns in the writing; his Africa fantasy comes to mind though elements of his concertos also influenced it but it is utterly charming and highly effective in its own right. Even Saint-Saëns’ shorter concertante works seldom appear in concert so it is hardly likely to be coming soon to a concert hall near you as the saying goes but at least we can enjoy this thrilling performance with excellent support from Neeme Järvi and the Estonian players. Shelest follows this with six of Chaminade’s miniatures including the Scarf Dance, an excerpt from her ballet Callirhoë. This was once so popular that it was even adopted and adapted by jazz players but it is not often heard nowadays. There is Autrefois,a lovely pastoral minuet with a faster central section that mimics Scarlatti; it was a favourite of Shura Cherkassky’s. Arlequine is a high-spirited character under Shelest’s sure fingers and there is real passion in the first arabesque. Chaminade is often almost damned with faint praise as a composer of high quality salon pieces but listening to any of these pieces and especially the tender solitude and yearning le passé which are rarities on disc, one could wonder whether Grieg’s Lyric pieces, for example are merelyhigh-quality salon pieces? Certainly there is no lack of quality in Chaminade’s music and her emotional range is in no way inferior; hopefully this release will help others to explore beyond Automne and her flute concertino.

I am not aware that the Pièces Romantiques for piano duet have been recorded before. Chaminade made a solo arrangement of the final piece Rigaudon which was recorded by Peter Jacobs (Hyperion CDA66846) though the booklet writer for that release thought it might be a transcription of an orchestral work. The set opens with primavera, a suave and rather wonderfully schmaltzy waltz while la chaise à porteurs, the sedan chair, is a swift courante from a baroque suite; pity the poor porters who have to hurry at this rate. Idylle arabe has no real exoticism to its harmony or melody but this lilting serenade waltz is a beauty nonetheless. Waltz rhythms abound in this collection and continue with the sweeping Autumn serenade, the song of a very confident serenader with some sparkling guitar arabesques at his command. Caution is thrown to the wind in a dizzying danse hindoue, a constant stream of moto perpetuo semiquavers for player one over barbaric, at least for Chaminade, percussive and highly rhythmic music for player two. The set ends with the rigaudon,a delightful piece of mock baroque that can’t help to raise a smile. This is Chaminade’s only work for piano duet – there are some two piano pieces, budding players on the look out for novelties be aware – but it is well worth exploring and I am sorry I have missed out on it until now. Shelest is joined here by her husband Dmitri and I am thrilled with their lively, colourful playing. I have expressed my admiration for ms Shelest before and she is absolutely winning on this disc, a fabulous addition to her growing discography of female composers and a disc that I keep coming back to. I hope that the Donna’s voice gets a fourth volume.

Rob Challinor

Contents
Clara Schumann (1819-1896)
Piano Concerto in A minor Op.7 (1833-34)
Quatre Pièces fugitives Op.15 (1843)
Impromptu in E Major (publ.1885)
Cécile Chaminade (1857-1944)Concertstück for piano and orchestra Op.40 (c.1888)
Arabesque No.1 Op.61 (1892)
Autrefois from Pièces humoristiques Op.87 No.4
Arlequine Op.53 (1890)
Scarf Dance from Callirhoë Op.37
Solitude from Poèmes provençaux Op.127 No.2 (c.1908)
Le Passé from Poèmes provençaux Op.127 No.3 (c.1908)
Pièces Romantiques Op.55 for piano four hands (1890)

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