Description
SOMM Recordings continues its close partnership with the distinguished mixed-instrument ensemble I Musicanti in a release of chamber music for strings by the British composer Ivor Hodgson. I Musicanti and its founding artistic director, internationally renowned double bass virtuoso and conductor Leon Bosch, share with SOMM a commitment to artistic enterprise. Their collaboration, combining advocacy, scholarship, and performance at the highest level, has built a distinctive and critically acclaimed discography. Hodgson's 2025 SOMM debut featured his firstPiano Quintet performed by I Musicanti and Peter Donohoe on a release of British Piano Quintets [SOMMCD 0707]. This new release features three of his chamber works: his String Quintet No. 1, "Sonata da chiesa;" String Quintet No. 2, "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star;" and String Septet No. 1, "The Women of Gairsay." Although Hodgson has composed a great variety of music in all genres, it is perhaps chamber music that lies closest to his heart, and the three significant works on this release are indicative of his inherent mastery of thegenre. His proficiency is fully demonstrated in his earliest composition, the String Quintet No.1, "Sonata da chiesa," which takes its name from the musical form that emerged in Italy at the beginning of the 17th century.Hodgson's sonata is in three movements: "Come una chiesa" (Like a Church); "Processione;" and "Pregare" (To Pray). The composer displays his structural and expressive command in music that finds depth in what might at first appear to be quite simple material. Whilst Hodgson's String Quintet No.1 was his first completed composition, his String Quintet No. 2, "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star," is his most recent. It was inspired by a Dark Sky experience in New Zealand that sparked an idea for a piece that would portray the continual shifting of light and distances involved in travelling through space. Each movement reflects on the beloved nursery rhyme: 1: "Twinkle, twinkle, little star, how I wonder what you are;" 2: "Up above the world so high, like a diamond in the sky;" and 3: "Twinkle, twinkle, little star, though I know not what you are." The poem "The Women of Gairsay," written for Hodgson by the Scottish journalist and writer Erlend Clouston, weaves together themes of Viking journeys, the resilience of the women left behind, and the interplay of hope and loss, with the sea ever present. The seven movements of Hodgson's String Septet No. 1, "The Women of Gairsay" quote from the work--Women's lament | Chorale of the dragon men | Bury the drum beat | Raven's beak | Skimming stones | Glacier wind | The boat that never came back--providing an outline to the poem and the music it inspired.
