Jack McNeill & LePage Trio
Jack McNeill brings his clarinet back to Bollington with the outstanding Le Page Trio to perform two widely contrasting works: Paul Moravec’s studies of characters from Shakespeare’s The Tempest and Messiaen’s transcendental Quartet… A concert not to be missed.
Bollington audiences know Jack McNeil as a virtuoso clarinettist who is equally at home with the clarinet and bass clarinet but he says “as a clarinettist my performance background has spun between the worlds of music, theatre and movement.” Whilst he performs regularly with leading ensembles like the Le Page Trio and the Gildas Quartet (last year he joined the Gildas at Bollington) he teaches and runs chamber music creative courses and works with other musicians both as a performer and composer. He has been artist in residence at Snape Maltings Open Space and at Sage Gateshead Summer Studios.
He is joined today by the Le Page Trio, the ensemble founded by David Le Page. David is well known as an outstanding violinist whose career began early when he became a prize winner in the BBC Young Musician of the Year and in the Yehudi Menuhin competitions. Building on that youthful start he has worked with a wide range of ensembles as a director, soloist and chamber musician and formed his own groups. Today he is joined by cellist Clare O’Connel and pianist Viv McLean. His many recordings include complete Tippett and Shostakovich quartets and the Goldberg Variations with the Le Page ensemble.
Clare followed her Oxford studies in Ancient and Modern History with study at the Royal College of Music and at the Hochschule fur Kunst in Bremen. As a cellist she is passionate about chamber music and plays with several different ensembles and has also formed her own series of intimate concerts in Berkhamstead, experimenting with varying instrumental lineups and making her own arrangements of a vast array of music for unusual groups of instruments. Her arrangements have been performed in Westminster Abbey and at the Wigmore Hall and have also been featured on BBC Radio 3.
Pianist Viv McClean came to the fore when he won First Prize in the 2002 Maria International Piano Competition in Barcelona and has subsequently worked with many orchestras including The Philharmonia, LPO and Halle. As well as working with the Le Page Trio Viv regularly collaborates with other groups including the Léopold String Trio, the Ysaye and the Sacconi String Quartets. Le Monde said of him “Viv McLean revealed extraordinary originality, superb simplicity and muscles of steel hidden by fingers of velvet!” He has recorded for several labels and regularly appears on BBC Radio 3 and on radio in places as far apart as France and Australia.
Jack McNeill, clarinet
David LePage, violin
Clare O’Connell, cello
Viv McLean, piano
Moravec – Tempest Fantasy
Messiaen – Quartet for the End of Time
Auditorium Tickets £20, Students £2, Live Stream £10 available from Bollington Chamber Concerts.
