Robert Plane — Clarinet
‘This is an extremely important addition to the corpus of Cyril Scott’s recorded music. For one thing, four out of the five works are premiere recordings. Secondly, the playing by the Gould Piano Trio and the clarinet soloist Robert Plane is both convincing and sympathetic. Scott’s music covers a wide range of styles and musical language – and each works needs a different approach. This awareness of the composer’s ‘periods’ has been well attended to.’
Musicweb International
‘Chandos continues to fly the flag for neglected 20th-century British music with this excellently played selection of Cyril Scott’s chamber music. All the major works here, except the first piano trio, were composed after the second world war, and all but the clarinet quintet are recorded here for the first time. Taken individually, the pieces are impressive – fluent, and well structured, with the Debussyan influences of especially the first piano trio well integrated into what is fundamentally a late romantic idiom.’
The Guardian
‘Both in this piece and in the Clarinet Quintet that follows, Robert Plane is an eloquent and impassioned clarinettist. The playing is full-blooded and committed and, as you listen to the music, you begin to realise that Scott had a distinctive and individual voice and that he was a composer of real imagination and merit.’
International Record Review
‘Between them Chandos and Dutton have totally transformed the Cyril Scott discography in the past few years, so that we begin to know this elusive and prolific composer much better; but there are still treasures to find. Chandos continues the process with a valuable disc of chamber music. Only the amiable 1951 Clarinet Quintet has been recorded before, but it’s the 1955 Clarinet Trio that seems the most striking and characterful work here. The excellent Gould Trio are the stalwarts of this enjoyable disc.’
BBC Music Magazine
Robert Plane won the Royal OverSeas League Music Competition in 1992. Since then his solo and chamber career has taken him to prestigious venues across Europe and beyond, performing Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto in Madrid’s Auditorio Nacional de Musica with the City of London Sinfonia, on tour in the USA with the Virginia Symphony and throughout China with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, during which his performance at Beijing’s National Centre for the Performing Arts was broadcast live to a TV audience of 6 million.
[biography] Robert has become particularly known for his performances and recordings of the magnificent English repertoire for clarinet. Gramophone magazinehas praised playing of ‘ravishing lyricism and conviction by Robert Plane, who has now surely fully occupied the shoes of the late Thea King in his championship of British clarinet music.’ His benchmark recording of Finzi’s Clarinet Concerto (BBC Radio 3 Building a Library recommendation and part of the Naxos British Music Series which won a Gramophone Award in 1999) is still a regular feature of the playlists of both Radio 3 and Classic FM nearly twenty years after its initial release. He subsequently recorded discs ofmusic by Bax (a further Gramophone Award shortlisting), John Ireland, Howells, Alwyn, Holbrooke, Robin Milford and Stanford, including Stanford’s Clarinet Concerto with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra.
Robert made his solo debut at the BBC Proms in 2011 in Simon Holt’s double concerto ‘Centauromachy’. He gave the world premiere of Piers Hellawell’s ‘Agricolas’, with subsequent performances and a CD recording for Delphian with the Ulster Orchestra and the RTE National Symphony Orchestra. Other notable premieres include the clarinet concerto by Diana Burrell, with performances with Royal Northern Sinfonia at the Huddersfield Contemporary Festival and at the Barbican, and Nicola LeFanu’s Concertino. He gave the UK premiere of Christian Jost’s ‘Heart of Darkness’ before taking it the Dortmund Philharmonic during their season celebrating that composer’s works. Other overseas engagements include Copland with the Malta Philharmonic in Valletta and a gala performance of the Bruch Double Concerto for clarinet and viola with the Symphony Orchestra of Sri Lanka as part of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in 2013.
Robert has formed close partnerships with a number of leading chamber ensembles. He has performed and recorded with the Gould Piano Trio for over twenty years and their recording of Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time was hailed by Gramophone as the ‘finest modern version’ of this monumental work. He also appears on the Gould Trio’s recorded cycle of the complete trios of both Beethoven and Brahms. Together they direct theCorbridge Chamber Music Festival in Northumberland. He has collaborated with the Maggini, Dante, Auer, Carducci, Cavalleri, Brodsky and Tippett Quartets, and his performance of the Brahms Clarinet Quintet with the Skampa Quartet was broadcast live on Radio 3 on the opening night of that station’s ‘Brahms Experience’. Robert has given concerts with the Mandelring Quartet in Germany, the UK and on a West Coast USA tour and a series of recitals in Switzerland with the Swiss Piano Trio. He has performed with pianist Sophia Rahman since meeting as students at the Royal Academy of Music, for music clubs and festivals throughout the UK and on tour in South America, China, New Zealand and Sri Lanka.
Alongside his solo and chamber work Robert has held the position of principal clarinet with Royal Northern Sinfonia, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and BBC National Orchestra of Wales. He has played as a guest principal with the Royal Concertgebouw, the London Symphony Orchestra and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe.
Robert teaches at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama and gives an annual class at the Royal Academy of Music in London. He has given masterclasses at the Royal College of Music, Trinty Laban, Birmingham Conservatoire, Beijing Conservatoire and the San Fransisco Conservatory.
Robert is married to the violinist Lucy Gould and lives in Cardiff with their three children. In his spare time he enjoys distance running and is a regular marathon runner.