★★★★★/★★★★★
It’s not often one gets the opportunity to review two composers who slept together, so I’ll grab this chance with both hands. In 1938, the Czech composer Bohuslav Martinu was living in Paris, watching his country disappear. His wife Charlotte, a French seamstress, kept them in food and clothes.
Along came a friend’s daughter Vitezslava Kapralova, seeking lessons. She was 22 and already performed by Rafael Kubelik and the Czech Philharmonic. Before long, they became lovers; before much longer she dumped him for a man her own age, the journalist Jiri Mucha. The Martinus made it to America. Kapralova died, aged 25, in a provincial French hospital.
The fifth quartet of Martinu, contemporaneous with their affair, is sombre, ominous, full of short bowings and plucked strings. Its finale has an end-of-the-world air about it. Compared to the 2nd, 3rd and 7th quartets on this album, it is achingly introspective and completely void of the Czech tunes that Martinu called on for moral support. This uncommonly dark Martinu mood is brought out with gripping veracity by the flawless, top-flight Pavel Haas Quartet. If the fifth quartet leaves you booking a date with Dignitas, play the seventh immediately for a swift recovery.
Kapralova’s songs, which I’ve never heard before, are delivered in impeccable Czech by the Scottish tenor Nicky Spence, who specialises in Janacek anti-heroes at the opera. There is a lot of Janacek in Kapralova, but also a friskiness that befits a young woman on the brink of success. Her 1937 six-minute ode, Waving Farewell, addressed to her native Prague is deeply affecting. A 1933 set, Sparks from Ashes, is more romantic. Spence, with pianist Dylan Perez, is in his element. His dynamic span from whisper to ear-blast is phenomenal.
The rest of their recital is made up of songs by Dvorak, Bartok and Kricka. Could any Czech composer have dreamed they would ever be this well performed?
