Closing Concert of Eva van Grinsven’s Saxophone Masterclass Presented by Liszt Academy

This programme explores the saxophone through a wide range of styles, timbres and colours. The instrument possesses a remarkable ability to evoke the human voice: it can sing, scream, whisper, pray, plead, moan, cry and laugh, giving musical expression to a broad spectrum of human emotions.

These expressions are an integral part of life, yet their meaning and intensity may change as we move through its different stages. Composers have long sought to find their own distinctive musical voice, expressing through their works their individual stories, ideas and emotions. Their music can also reflect the particular stage of life in which it was created.

Several works on this programme were composed during the composers’ youth, including pieces by Samama and Rosenthal, as well as some of the works by Shostakovich. Although very different in style, they share a sense of direct energy and, at times, exuberance that conveys the intensity and immediacy with which emotions are often experienced in youth.

Firsova’s work, composed in mid-life, reveals a more reflective and contemplative atmosphere, while also containing moments that suggest commentary, questioning and complaint.

Brahms composed his two sonatas for clarinet and viola three years before his death. Despite the mature compositional mastery evident in both works, the Second Sonata is, at many moments, remarkably lively, intimate and passionate—as though capturing the intensity of falling deeply in love for the first time.

This quality may in part be connected to Brahms’s “muse”, Richard Mühlfeld, the exceptionally gifted clarinettist whose unique sound, including his distinctive use of vibrato, inspired Brahms to compose his four celebrated works for clarinet towards the end of his life, one year after Mühlfeld’s retirement.

At the heart of this programme lies the search for an individual voice: a voice through which music can express the full spectrum of human experience and, through art, contribute to a more beautiful and peaceful world.