Marina Marsden
Marina Marsden plays violin with passion, fire and a spiritual tone. Her programmes pair early Grieg and Nielsen sonatas with Sculthorpe's lonely Irkanda I, Christian Heim's Transformation written for her, and the intimate chamber music of Margaret Sutherland.
Strong, communicative and risk-taking, she keeps her vivacity even under the studio microphone. With pianist Robert Chamberlain the rapport is plain: the Grieg and Nielsen leap out with sheer exhilaration, full of the joy of life. Sculthorpe's unaccompanied Irkanda I is thoughtfully done, bird calls and all; Heim's peppy rhythms engage; Kreisler's Caprice Viennois is played with skill and affection. In Margaret Sutherland she finds a warm, rounded sound sensitive to every mood, from the rhapsodic Violin Sonata to the haunting World and the Child for mezzo and string trio. Wonderful phrases arrive on inaudible bow changes. Technique is faultless, yet the playing always serves the music's fire and intimacy, whether Brahms or Australian chamber works.
Marina Marsden is featured on the following titles
Margaret Sutherland: The Chamber Music with Strings
World premiere recordings of marvellous chamber music by one of Australia's neglected composers. Margaret Sutherland (1897–1984) studied with Arnold Bax in the 1920s and returned home to write some of this country's most original and striking works.
Violin Recital
Marina Marsden, then Deputy Concertmaster of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and a seasoned chamber player, brings faultless technique and real insight to these less familiar corners of the violin repertoire.
Marina Marsden also appears on
Woman's Song: Australian Settings of Poetry by Judith Wright
Elizabeth Campbell has long been a tireless promoter of Australian art song. With Tony Fogg in the 1980s she presented the recital series From Nathan To Now; two decades later she brought that energy to a recording of settings of poetry by Judith Wright.