Bernhard Crusell: Bassoon Concertino (1829)

00:00 - I. Allegro brillante (to Poco adagio)
07:32 - II. Allegro moderato
11:28 - III. Polacca
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Bassoon: Klaus Thunemann
Conductor: Sir Neville Marriner
Orchestra: Academy of St. Martin in the Fields
Year of Recording: 1995
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"The Swedish composer Bernhard Crusell was born in Finland when that country was part of Sweden’s empire, became famous not as a flutist but as one of the greatest clarinet virtuosos of his time. The son of a poor family, he rose, after army service, to become clarinettist and deputy conductor with the Royal Court Orchestra in Stockholm. Though he remained based in Sweden, he travelled widely, studying composition in Berlin, Paris and Leipzig, and absorbed a great deal of European culture which enabled him to become an important force in Swedish music.

Crusell wrote in many genres, but he is naturally especially renowned for his clarinet compositions – which include three magnificent concertos. The Bassoon Concertino in B flat was the last concerto of any kind that Crusell wrote. He composed it in 1829, for his son-in-law Frans Preumayr, renowned as one of the great bassoon virtuosi of his time. Preumayr was about to embark on a major concert tour of France, Germany and England and needed a new concerto to play. Before his departure he played Crusell’s Concertino for the first time in Stockholm in September 1829 and declared himself delighted with it, saying it would be his ‘cheval de bataille’ (war-horse).

The first movement opens in festive and rather grand style with an orchestral tutti which the bassoon answers with an agile cadenza. It then moves to a plaintive melody, Poco adagio that in fact derives from an opera by Crusell’s French contemporary, Adrien Boieldieu. The materials are then worked out in a compressed sonata form. There is no real slow movement – the second movement, unusually, follows the first without a break, and proves to be a short sequence of variations on Boieldieu’s melody. The Concertino then concludes with a lively movement in Polonaise rhythm, full of humour and bravura display over the entire range of the bassoon.” (Calum MacDonald)
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