Herrmann: Souvenirs de Voyage

The iciness and drama of his great film scores contrasts powerfully with the reserved and lyrical beauty of Bernard Herrmann’s chamber music. Souvenir de Voyage was his final concert work, each of the three movements having roots in a different work of art – A.E. Houseman’s On Wenlock Edge, Synge’s novel Riders to the Sea and the Venetian watercolours of J.M.W. Turner. This rhythmically sinuous clarinet quintet is both vivid and graceful. David Del Tredici’s Magyar Madness fuses ardency with playful wit, its long finale a vast and wild ‘Hungarian frenzy’.