Bright Vessel

Stephen Robinson, Principal Oboe with Orchestra Victoria, gives us a new release of post 1990s Australian oboe music. This includes solo works, oboe & piano and chamber music selections. Robinson draws on his deep understanding of contemporary performance techniques along with a small who’s who of contemporary music performance in Australia including Merlyn Quaife, Marshall McGuire and Slava Grigoryan.

Robinson, with this recording, shows that he is one of the few oboists who give any serious attention to the current Australian oboe repertoire, alongside colleagues such as David Nuttall, for whom several of the compositions on this disc were written, and Diana Doherty for whom, most famously, the Ross Edwards and Graeme Koehne concertos were written.

This disc covers a wide range of contemporary styles, with elements of the late 20th century avant-garde oboe techniques being employed in several of the compositions to picturesque melodic material that could be set for theatre or film.

The Hindson two Night Pieces for Oboe and Piano is a combination of these, with a subtle and sweet opening work followed by the Night Dance a work using micro tonal timbre fingerings, key clicks and striking rhythm to create an exotic feel and energy with the piano.

This recording also brings to the audience the first full rendition of the Six Preludes for Solo Oboe by Richard Mills. Three of these were previously released by Queensland Oboist Tania Fraser (Disc:4MBSFM10 Southern Cross Soloists). This work has been a main stay in the Australian Music Examinations Board Syllabus for Oboe along with the Mills Pastoral for solo oboe and the Larry Sitsky Sayat Nova for solo oboe, and to have them now finally available on a single disc will aid in the expansion of these works into the better-known repertoire.

The real surprise was the work by Brenton Broadstock. Titled ‘I Touched Your Glistening Tears’ this work is very accessible to the listener with a highly melodic content that weaves and moves very well with the piano over this almost 9 minute work. This piece deserves a substantial listening along with the jazz rhythms and overall joy of Elena Kats-Chernin Charmer’s Apprentice.

Aspiring oboist, Australian music devote or just looking for a new and interesting disc, there are more than enough reasons to add this recording to your collection.