Klarinet Archive - Posting 000529.txt from 1997/12

From: Mark Charette <charette@-----.com>
Subj: De Peyer [forwarded from John Gates]
Date: Thu, 11 Dec 1997 19:42:03 -0500

John's having trouble posting, so I'm forwarding this for him:

Today I spent nearly an hour and read all the recent comments on Gervase
de
Peyer. Thanks for Mark's database!!! I think that with the exception
of a
very few (Nancy Sulfridge, Jim and Dan P) none of the commentaries have
looked at the whole picture of what he has brought to performance.
First of all his rhythm is compelling; I don't mean necessarily
metronomic
but the type that makes for very exciting playing. Heifetz had that
same
sort of quality. Secondly he has/had a wonderful sound in so many
respects,
however it certainly is not a beautiful tone all the time. He is able
to
play extremely brilliantly and then take the tone, when the music calls
for
it, and melt all that urgency into intimacy. Yes usually with an
English
style vibrato (thank you Haydn Draper and Reginald Kell). Who else
does
this? Thirdly he has the talent to walk out on stage and make the air
sizzle with excitement. There is something very thrilling about
Gervase.
You know something is going to happen when he walks out on stage, in
this
respect he is a natural performer.
Now for some info that any of you that have been affected positively or
negatively by Gervase de Peyer's playing might find interesting.
Sometime
in the mid sixties he became very dissatisfied with mouthpieces. I
studied
off and on with him from 66-68. I remember that he was always trying to
find a mouthpiece that could give him the ability of playing with great
flexibility. When he made the 2nd recording of the Weber Quintet (for
EMI/angel) Cecil Aronowitz, violist with Melos ensemble, told me that he
would squeak so much that took out a pocket knife and work on his
mouthpiece
when the rest of them listened to playbacks!! I remember once when he
was
about 40 yrs. old that he showed me a box with over a hundred
mouthpieces
that he had worked on.
I think that after he came back to London after studying with Cahuzac he
played his best. It was then that he just got into the London Symphony
Orchestra and recorded his first Mozart Conc. (the one with the bassoon
conc. on the other side). He played it like Weber. It was very fast
and
brilliant. Jim Lythons has this recording. Incidentally he is the
clarinetist on just about all the recordings of the LSO in the sixties.
He's the clarinetist on the Joseph Krips Beethoven Cycle, all the Dvorak
cycle with Istvan Kertez (also Galanta Dances with Kertez), and a slew
of
other ones. He also played Principal on all the Peter Maag Mendelssohn
works (probably the greatest Scottish symphony ever recorded, thanks
Peter
Maag)
Shortly after he recorded the Weber2/Spohr1, with the young Colin Davis
conducting a rough sounding LSO, the Weber 5tet and Kegelstatt and a
clarinet recital album including Le Tombeau de Ravel, Martinu Sonatina
and
Weber Grand duo Concertante. These recordings launched his career.
There
was a new voice on the clarinet, nobody had ever played like that
before.
Wow. All of a sudden the clarinet opened up an exciting experience, not
just another beautiful sound. He could play like Kell but also with the
energy of Horowitz.

At any rate he had some dental work (never have an English dentist do
work
on your mouth) including a root canal sometime in 1967 and from then on
his
tone began to deteriorate, also he started squeaking alot. I think that
his
dental work, and not therefore not being able to produce the tone he
wanted
to, and his drive to make the polarize the tempers of the music had a
negative effect on certain aspects of his tone.
I hope he is doing well, like Kell his career never did that well when
he
came to America and I know he's probably not all that happy with the way
certain events have gone. He tried to launch a conducting career but it
never took.

John Gates
cadenza@-----.com
--
Mark Charette | "This is a very democratic organization, so let's
charette@-----. All those who disagree with me, raise
Mika Systems, Inc.| their hands." - Eugene Ormandy
Webmaster of http://www.sneezy.org/clarinet, The Clarinet Pages