Robert Plane’s career as a solo and chamber clarinettist is rich and varied. Concerto appearances in Europe, Asia and North America have included performances of Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto in Madrid with the City of London Sinfonia, Beijing with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and in the USA with the Virginia Symphony. A champion of new music as well as the classics, Rob is equally at home performing Christian Jost’s concerto ‘Heart of Darkness’ with the Dortmunder Philharmoniker and Simon Holt’s ‘Centauromachy’ at the BBC Proms as playing Finzi with the Zurich Chamber Orchestra, Stanford with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and Copland with the London Mozart Players.
Rob has tirelessly pursued a particular passion for British clarinet music in concert and on disc, his Gramophone Award-winning account of Finzi’s Concerto and Gramophone Award-shortlisted Bax Sonatas being just two of a large collection of recordings of works by the great English Romantics. He rediscovered concertos by Iain Hamilton, Richard Walthew and Ruth Gipps for his 2020 album ‘Reawakened’ with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and is currently researching the music of Pamela Harrison, releasing two discs of her chamber music to date.
He has performed and recorded with the Gould Piano Trio for thirty years, and their recording of Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time to mark the composer’s centenary was hailed by BBC Music Magazine as the ‘finest modern recording’ of this epic masterpiece. Rob enjoys a close relationship with the Elias String Quartet, making his debut at the 2023 Schubertiade Schwarzenberg with them in Brahms, and joining them at the Wigmore Hall for Brahms and Bliss. He has given concerts in Germany and the USA with the Mandelring Quartet and at home in the UK with, amongst others, the Skampa, Marmen, Castalian, Maggini, Brodsky, Carducci, Sacconi and Heath Quartets.
Rob is clarinettist of Ensemble 360 and enjoys exploring chamber music of all kinds with them at their home in the Crucible, Sheffield and country wide. They recently released a recording of Pierrot Lunaire and other Pierrot inspired works with soprano Claire Booth, to mark the 150th anniversary of Schoenberg’s birth.
Rob was principal clarinet of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales for over twenty years and has held the same position with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Royal Northern Sinfonia. In a distinguished orchestral career, he has performed as guest principal clarinet with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam, London Symphony Orchestra and in Aurora Orchestra’s performances of Brahms 1 from memory. He was invited by composer James Newton Howard to be solo clarinettist for the score to the Disney film Maleficent. Rob holds the post of Head of Woodwind Performance at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama.
How do you cope with being on the road, or the time between?
The amount of touring I’ve done has been quite moderate compared to many other orchestral musicians. During my days at BBC NOW we often toured to really interesting and unusual places though. Our trip to the Welsh speaking region of Patagonia springs to mind, and on that trip there were always such fascinating things to do and see (penguin- and whale-watching, for example!) in between concerts. It tends to be the off-the-beaten-track tours that I coped with much better, rather than a concert every night in a different city type of European tour, which I always found a struggle. It’s no exaggeration to say that all you see of a city is your hotel and the concert hall! Chamber tours are always much more pleasurable and just logistically so much easier than herding a whole orchestra around. But I’ve always got the next concert in the back of my mind on a day off between concerts, sadly!
What was the first ‘spark’ with regards to chamber music for you?
As a clarinettist there’s nothing more satisfying than playing the great works with string quartet. So for me it was beginning to play the Mozart, Brahms and Weber quintets with some lovely string quartets. Meeting Lucy and subsequently performing with the Gould Trio was a game-changer for me.
How do you approach the practice and performance of contemporary works?
With a brand new work this is a much more gradual process than playing a familiar classic, as there are no pre-existing reference points from having heard previous interpretations. And you have to have an amazing ear to be able to hear a complex score in your head simply by looking at it! So it’s a process of evolving together with your musical partners. There’s inevitably much more ‘fitting it together’; in the early stages before the work of interpreting can begin. It helps to have an overview of the composer’s style from other pieces for sure. And some composers will leave much less room for manoeuvre than others. Diana Burrell’s new piece for this festival for example leaves freedom of articulation to the performers, which is quite an unusual but liberating concept.
How did you start playing music, and what or who continues to inspire you?
I started playing through free peripatetic lessons at school. It was a totally different age to the current system of lessons only for those who can afford to pay, which is fundamentally threatening the profession. A transformative moment was going to hear Jack Brymer play Mozart Clarinet Concerto in my home town of Great Yarmouth (where concerts were a rarity) when I was twelve. I got to meet him in the interval - he was my hero.
Your most embarrassing moment, either in rehearsal or in concert?
Playing the clarinet runs the risk of two embarrassing but easy-to-happen things. We’re all liable to squeak on the clarinet (some players more than others!) and we all dread it happening at a terrible moment. The other is playing on the B flat clarinet rather than the A, or vice versa, by mistake. I remember a performance of Elijah with RNS in Carlisle - the two clarinets come in really loudly in a fugue in unison. Sadly, one of us was on B flat and one on A so we blasted the entry in semitones.