Klarinet Archive - Posting 000759.txt from 2002/04

From: "Terry B" <tbroyles99@-----.com>
Subj: RE: [kl] tv performance of 622 - Sharon Kam
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 22:26:33 -0400

> Today they presented a performance of the second movement of K. 622 as
> played by Sharon Kam, who I believe is a young woman based on the fact
> that the accompanying group was the European Community Youth
Orchestra,
> and I'm presuming she is a clarinet player in that group.
>
> If my assumptions are right and she is somewhere between 17 and 23,
she
> is to be commended for such a splendid adult interpretation of the
work,
> though it was about as conservative as one can get. Still, her pitch
> was solid, her mechanical skills excellent, and she had a sense of
style
> usually not present in a young student.
>
> Unfortunately, the director of the TV film decided to be very modern,
so
> he placed a number of nice looking young students around a very large,
> and otherwise empty room, with each holding but not playing an
> instrument. I have no idea who these people were or if they had
> anything to do with the European Community Youth Orchestra. One such
> person held a clarinet, it was a young woman, and she was about 20, so
> maybe that was Sharon Kam.
>
> Does anyone know her?

I bought a CD by her just last Saturday. Clarinet Concertos - Mozart in
A Major K 622 & Krommer in E flat Major op. 36. She plays with the
Wurttemberg Chamber Orchestra on this CD. It is excellent! My daughter
is the clarinet player of the family and this has served as good
motivation for her as Sharon did not start playing clarinet until she
was 12 years old, like my daughter. Sharon Kam will be 31 this year.

Some notes from the CD jacket:

"Sharon Kam was only 12 when she decided to become a soloist, rather
than pursue the usual career of an orchestra woodwind player. She had
just started taking clarinet lessons, and it was not long before she
made her professional debut playing Schumann's Phantasiestucke op 73.
She had if fact spent a number of years playing a recorder, an
instrument on which she had enjoyed some notable successes and that had
given her a good deal of pleasure, but it's limited repertory finally
persuaded her to switch to the clarinet"

There is a lot more, but I am a lousy typist, and that's all you are
going to get from me. :-)

If you would like to know more about her I would be happy to get one of
my kids to type the jacket notes in their entirety. They can both use
the practice.

Terry Broyles
Proud parent of Christina on piano & clarinet, and Michael on trumpet
;-)

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