Michele Carulli, Serena Chillemi - Gade, Saint-Saëns, Martinů, Poulenc: Les Affinités (Fantasias and Sonatas for Clarinet and Piano at the Dawn of the 20th Century) (2021)

The first masterpieces which saw the clarinet as their protagonist date back to the classical era (one is immediately reminded of Mozart’s Quintet and Concerto). Mozart was perhaps the first among the greatest composers to understand the instrument’s potential in the complementary fields of brilliant transparency and shadowy elegy. Mozart successfully managed to exploit the clarinet’s bubbling irony and agility, and its expressive variety; his heritage was developed in the early nineteenth century, particularly by Carl Maria von Weber. Similar to Mozart, Weber had a humorous and sparkling vein, but also a penchant for mysterious and enchanting sounds: it comes as no surprise that the clarinet was one of his favourite instruments, given the complementary strengths of this marvellous woodwind instrument.