John Subject: Full Nocturnes (DG)
★★★★★
Probably the most influential Irishman within the historical past of music is just not Bob Geldof, Bono, Sinead O’Connor or the Dubliners, all of whom are well-known as influenza, however a reasonably obscure piano salesman who awoke a sub-continent to its inventive potential.
John Subject was born in Dublin in 1782 to Anglican dad and mom who took him to London to work for Muzio Clementi, Beethoven’s publishing companion and piano seller. As a rep for the rich Clementi, Subject travelled to Paris and Vienna earlier than settling in St Petersburg, the place he starred on the new-founded Philharmonic Society. Subject gave three piano classes to Mikhail Glinka, who become the primary profitable Russian composer.
In London in the meantime, Clementi printed Subject’s works, amongst them a line of ‘nocturnes’, by which he meant moods that go bump within the night time. Chopin later claimed the style as his personal. Subject, a little bit of a boozer, died in Moscow on the age of 54 and was comprehensively forgotten.
The German-Japanese pianist Alice Sara Ott got here throughout his music throughout COVID lockdown whereas searching for music ‘that may replicate my mildly depressed frame of mind on the time.’ Ott’s method to the nocturnes is audibly post-Chopin, however none the more severe for that. The appropriate hand takes runs to the moon whereas the left picks out a hummable melody.
There are 18 nocturnes within the album and the second, in C minor, is essentially the most demonstrably Chopin-basket. I’m drawn to the lyrical fifth, in B flat main, a wisp of regrets.
Ott’s enjoying is charming, even when the music will get too wispy. Don’t pay attention the entire set without delay otherwise you may not sleep at night time, however two or three will uplift your temper.
This set is certainly a keeper. I hear it’s DG’s most-streamed album of the second.
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Norman Lebrecht is without doubt one of the most widely-read commentators on music, tradition and cultural politics. He’s a daily presenter on BBC Radio 3 and a contributor to the Wall Avenue Journal, Bloomberg, Standpoint, Sinfini and different publications. His weblog, Slipped Disc, is among the many most generally learn cultural websites on-line, breaking unique tales and campaigning in opposition to human abuse and acts of injustice within the cultural industries.
