Chamber Group off to a Good Start – By Derek Moore Morgan – 23rd April 1979
The recently formed Wigmore Ensemble made its first public appearance last night with a delightfully varied program at the Octagon Theatre. A flexible group with no fixed numbers, it has the practical advantage of being able to present music of widely different genres some of which inevitably gets left on the shelf because it doesn’t quite fit a specific mould such as the string quartet or Trio. This was a University of W.A. music Society recital. The performers were Graham Wood and Ashley Arbuckle (violins), John Dean (viola), Jill Cole (cello), Neil Fisenden (flute), Jack Harrison (clarinet) and Anthony Maydwell (harp). The final item, Ravel’s atmospheric and beautifully crafted “Introduction and Allegro” brought all the players together to produce a nice degree of sonority and delicacy capturing much of the subtlety of the masterpiece. Starting with the Mozart Quartet for Flute and Strings in D major a mellifluous example of the composer’s earliest style, the players gave us a bright indication of the bubbling and effervescent Gatty of the Rondo finale. The British composer Frank Bridge, himself a viola player, wrote a whole body of telling string music. His little known Trio (Rhapsody) from 1928 proved to be a forward looking piece for the difficult unless usual combination of two violins and viola, with mysterious opening and closing sections surrounding an energetic central portion. The Italian composer Malpiero’s “Sonata a cinque” (1936) is an appealing piece of writing which hangs on the air like a haunting elergy. Anthony Maydwell’s expressive harp playing came to the fore here. The Quartet for clarinet and strings by Rawsthorne is another piece of chamber music which is deftly written and manipulates varying moods. Jack Harrison’s neatly inflected clarinet tone was well handled.
by Graham Wood:
Another excellent group in which I became involved was the “Wigmore Ensemble”. This was the brainchild of Tony Maydwell, a fine harpist who had come to live in Perth. The group consisted of a string quartet, with myself, Ashley Arbuckle, John Dean, Jill Cole [as she was then, nee Heady now Cooper], together with flautist Neil Fisenden and clarinettist Jack Harrison. Tony had a considerable collection of largely French ensemble music, which became the core repertoire of our concert and broadcast programs.