Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s Clarinet Quintet

Program:

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor – Clarinet Quintet in F-sharp minor, Op. 10

I. Allegro energico

II. Larghetto affettuoso

III. Scherzo

IV. Finale

Encore:

W.A. Mozart – Clarinet Quintet in A major, K. 381

II. Larghetto

He received his Bachelor’s degree and Performer’s Certificate from the Eastman School of Music, and his Master’s degree from the Juilliard School. As a Fulbright Scholar, he furthered his studies at the Hochschule der Künste in Berlin, where he collaborated with various members of the Berlin Philharmonic. His past teachers include Peter Rieckhoff, Charles Neidich, Kenneth Grant and Michael Webster.  Mr. Williamson was the grand prize winner of the 1994 Boosey & Hawkes/Buffet Crampon First Annual North American Clarinet Competition.

Other past awards include the Concert Artists Guild Competition as well as the Coleman International Chamber Music Competition. Mr. Williamson recently was selected to adjudicate for the XVI International Tchaikovsky Competition. This was the first time that woodwinds and brass were added to the competition.

A long-time Selmer-Paris and Vandoren Artist, Mr. Williamson currently plays Selmer Signature clarinets and uses Vandoren traditional reeds with a James Pyne “Williamson” model mouthpiece. He resides in Wilmette, IL with his wife Jill, sons Ryan, Connor and Matthew.

The Chen String Quartet has been playing together for 6 years. Committed to community outreach, they play at retirement homes and in hospitals regularly in the Chicago area. Robert Chen has been concertmaster of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra since 1999. Laura Chen is a former member of the first violin section of both Lyric Opera and Grant Park Symphony. Beatrice Chen is a viola student at The Curtis Institute of Music. Noah Chen is a student of Clara Kim at Juilliard Pre college.

At the age of 24, Samuel would marry Jessie Sarah Fleetwood Walmisley, who was a student alongside him at RCM. They would have a son and daughter over the next 4 years, who would both go on to have musical careers. With his wife being white, they would both receive racial harassment and targeted abuse. Many of his works would be seen to parallel the African-American experience, inspiring and inviting new audiences to his portfolio. Coleridge-Taylor would preface in his Twenty-Four Negro Melodies, “What Brahms has done for the Hungarian folk music, Dvorak for the Bohemian, and Grieg for the Norwegian, I have tried to do for these Negro melodies.” After reading the works of W.E.B. Du Bois, Coleridge-Taylor would become engaged with the issues of race and his own African background. In 1900 he would attend the first Pan-African conference in London, joining a circle of black activists.

Well known in America, a group of black singers founded the Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Choral Society in 1901 in Washington D.C. He would visit the USA for the first time three years later, being received with great acclaim. On the first tour, he would conduct the US Marines Band and on his 1910 tour he would conduct both exclusively white orchestras and all African-American orchestras. For him to conduct both the Marine Band and exclusively white orchestras at this time was unprecedented. He would also be invited and meet President Theodore Roosevelt during his first tour, an honor truly unheard of for a black man at the time.

Just a few weeks after his 37th birthday, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor collapsed on his way to the train station. He was able to make it home and passed away a few days later from acute pneumonia. His music would continue to be performed and praised for the next few decades but, like many things after World War II, his music disappeared from the canon. Thankfully like a lot of others lost, we are seeing a resurrection of his music due to a thirst for voices long forgotten.

In 1891, Johannes Brahms wrote his infamous Clarinet Quintet, Op. 115, leaving an impossible standard for others to amount to. This challenge was accepted by a 19 year-old Samuel Coleridge-Taylor who furiously worked all summer on his own Clarinet Quintet after hearing Brahms’ work. Also prompting his challenge was his composition teacher, Stanford, adding the challenge to not show the influence of Brahms in his work. Upon receiving the piece, Stanford responded with a ‘you’ve done it, me boy!’, foreshadowing the reception to come.

The first movement titled Allegro energico, showcases everyone equally, proving it is not simply a clarinet concerto. The following movements’ themes encapsulated the feeling of a folk song, being free and beautiful, including irregular phrase-length and frequently muting the strings to create the most deeply sensible music. The lively Scherzo houses a double time-signature of 3/4 9/8 creating fun interplay leading to sudden dynamic contrasts followed by a more tender trio, with a melody showing the influence of Dvorak. The finale is just that, the melody incorporating the enjoyable Scotch snap and leading to a bold development section. There is one last moment reminiscent of the larghetto followed by a Vivace coda ending in a manner that can’t help but bring to mind the end of Dvorak’s ‘American’ Quartet.

Fast Facts:

• Won the Lesley Alexander composition prize two years running in 1895 and 1896
• In 1911 his final commision, his Violin Concerto would go down with the Titanic on its way to the US premiere. One movement was ironically based on a spiritual titled Keep Me From Sinking Down
• Left behind his wife, son and daughter upon his untimely death

The Rush Hour Concerts series is supported in part by awards from the National Endowment for the Arts

and the Illinois Arts Council Agency.