Tankstream Quartet Brett Dean viola Peter Luff French horn Stephen Emmerson piano

The Tankstream Quartet comprising four of Australia’s most brilliant and versatile young musicians – Sophie Rowell and Anne Horton (violinists), Sally Boud (violist), and Rachel Johnston (cellist) – holds the distinction of having won more international chamber music competitions than any other ensemble in Australian history. They won First Prize at the 2005 Cremona International String Quartet Competition. They also won the 2001 Australian Chamber Music Competition, and then went on to win the Gold Medal in the 2002 Osaka International Chamber Music Competition (Japan). In 2004 they were the 2nd Prize Winner in the Paolo Borciani International String Quartet Competition in Italy and in 2003 the Quartet won the 3rd Prize and the Audience and Listeners’ Choice Awards at the 4th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition.Based in Germany, where they are mentored by the Alban Berg String Quartet at the Cologne Hochschule for Music, the Tankstream Quartet regularly performs throughout Europe. They were also selected by the Australian Government to perform the official music at the Danish Royal Wedding in May 2004. Future engagements include performances in Milan, Torino, Rome, Cremona, London, Frankfurt, and a tour of Japan. Next year they will tour Australia with the Jerusalem Quartet.The Tankstream Quartet have appeared in every capital city in Australia and at many of Australia’s major music festivals, and perform regularly for Musica Viva. They are also the patrons of the Murrumbidgee String Orchestra. The Tankstream Quartet has been broadcast extensively in Australia on ABC Classic FM and the MBS Network. Internationally, they have been featured on NDR (North German Radio), the BBC and Radio France and televised in Denmark, Austria and Japan. Formed in 2000 and originally mentored by Alice Waten (now Head of Strings at the Australian National Academy of Music) at the Australian Institute of Music where they hold fellowships, they have also received guidance from members of the Amadeus, Hagen and Smetana Quartets. Later this year they will become the new Australian String Quartet.

Brett DeanViola and Composition

Australian composer and viola player Brett Dean studied in Brisbane, graduating from the Queensland Conservatorium of Music in 1982 as Student of the Year. He began composing in 1988 while still a member of the Berlin Philharmonicís viola section, firstly making largely improvised film scores and radio projects for the ABC in Australia and various independent film-makers. Now his works are attracting attention throughout Europe, America and Australia, including performances in venues such as the Wigmore and Queen Elizabeth Halls in London, the Garnier Opera in Paris, the Burgtheater in Vienna, Alice Tully Hall in New York, the Berlin Philharmonie and of course the Sydney Opera House as well as at major festivals such as the BBC Proms, Lucerne Festival and the Lincoln Center Festival in New York.

A broad selection of his music has also been recorded for compact disc in Sweden (Triton’s Journey, Bis-CD-884), Australia (ABC Classics), Holland (Channel Classics) and for the Belgian label Sub Rosa as part of the composer/performer duo Frame-Cut-Frame. His works have been interpreted by, among others, orchestras such as the Berlin and Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestras, the Deutsches Symphonie Orchester Berlin, the BBC Symphony Orchestra as well as the symphony orchestras of Trondheim, Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney, West Australia, Winnipeg and his native Queensland, and ensembles such as the London Sinfonietta, Ensemble Modern and Paul Dean. A particularly fruitful relationship with the Australian Chamber Orchestra has resulted in four major works so far including one of Brett’s most frequently performed scores, Carlo, inspired by the music of Carlo Gesualdo. Brett also wrote the music for Czech choreographer Jiri Kylian’s highly acclaimed 3 act ballet One of a Kind which, since its premiere in The Hague in May 1998, has been performed more than 40 times throughout the world by the Nederlands Dans Theater. His first orchestral work, Ariel’s Music, a clarinet concerto written for his brother Paul, was honoured as the prize-winning Selected Work of the UNESCO International Rostrum of Composers in Paris in June 1999. His second composition for orchestra, Beggars and Angels, was honoured as Australian Composition of the Year at the Australian Music Centre’s 2000 Awards. In 2001, he won one of Australia’s most revered awards, the Paul Lowin Song Cycle Prize, for Winter Songs. Brett is the Artistic Director of the Australian National Academy of Music. Brett Dean’s works are published exclusively by Boosey & Hawkes and he is represented by Intermusica management.

MOZART Horn Quintet in E-flat Major, K. 407

Mozart’s Horn Quintet, along with four horn concerti, was inspired by and composed for Austrian horn player Ignaz Leutgeb. An extraordinarily gifted player, he was the first horn in the Archbishop of Salzburg’s private band and it was here that he and Mozart became acquainted. However, having Mozart’s friendship also meant suffering his pranks and practical jokes. The scores Mozart produced for his friend were peppered with what could be considered verbal abuse. One of the concerti bears the dedication “W.A. Mozart has taken pity on Leutgeb, ass, ox and fool, at Vienna, 27 March l783...” The horn part contains many such remarks as “Go it, Signor Asino” - “Take a little breath” - “Wretched pig” - “Thank God, here’s the end.

Despite the crude humor at his friend’s expense, Mozart clearly had great respect for Leutgeb’s musicianship. Of all the works written for horn by Mozart, the quintet is the most difficult, requiring the utmost virtuosity, especially for the valveless horn, for which it was written. In this work, Mozart pushed the player and instrument of his time to the limit. Essentially a miniature concerto with the strings serving in the main as accompaniment to the solo instrument, the second movement is where the strings come to the fore with interplay. This lovely intermezzo is undoubtedly motivated by practicality as well as aesthetic considerations, providing a needed rest for the soloist. The Quintet was completed on December 31, 1782

SHOSTAKOVICH Piano Quintet

Written amidst the oppressive atmosphere of a Stalinist Russia in 1940, Shostakovich’s Piano Quintet in G minor Op. 57 portrays elements of a creative force that had learned to become both personally and professionally dichotomous. On one hand was a man confined by stylistic uniformity and upholding party ideologies. On the other, a brilliant and artistically daring man who knew how to strike a delicate balance between pleasing the powers that be and producing truly innovative compositions.It could be argued at length which facet of Shostakovich dominates this particular piece of music. However, as with his Eighth Symphony, it is indisputable that the Piano Quintet holds an underlying message of hope, and in this case, the hope for a return to a Russia unclouded by fear and uncertainty.The Piano Quintet received its premiere in Moscow in November 1940 and reflects the concepts of Shostakovich’s rehabilitation strategy, which he constructed after his ‘fall from grace’ in 1936 (the systematic disgrace, and in some cases, murder, of composers who were perceived to be in direct opposition to the objectives of the Soviet Communist Party, otherwise known as the period of Great Terror). Shostakovich continually returned to contrapuntal writing when faced with creative block or lack of inspiration. This reversion to traditional compositional techniques and decidedly ‘Bachian influence,’ is evident in three of the five movements of the Piano Quintet and in the first movement of his Sixth Symphony. That is not to say that this piece is devoid of innovation and originality, quite the contrary. The Piano Quintet, like all of Shostakovich’s music, is both stirringly provocative and profoundly exquisite.

MOZART Horn Quintet in E-flat Major, K. 407

SHOSTAKOVICH Piano Quintet

Tankstream Quartet Brett Dean viola Peter Luff French horn Stephen Emmerson piano

CD download US$9.75

catalogue | resellers | about | formats | contact | free member downloads | become a member