One way of ensuring quality is to book award-winning young artists, and an excellent source of these over the years has been the ones selected annually and sponsored by the Philip & Dorothy Green Young Artists scheme run by Making Music.

This season’s choice for Dolgellau Music Club proved no exception, delivering a first-class recital presented in Coleg Meirion-Dwyfor on Friday, 13 January by clarinettist James Gilbert with collaborative pianist Julian Chan.

The centrepiece of the recital was Brahms’s lyrical Sonata in Eb Major Op.120 No.2. It’s always good to be reminded of the uplifting story behind this piece.

In 1890, aged 57, Brahms declared that he was done with composing, possibly even with living. Soon after however he heard (and formed a friendship with) clarinettist Richard Mühlfeld, who inspired from him four more great chamber works – the Clarinet Quintet, Trio, and Sonatas Op.120 Nos.1 & 2.

James and Julian did the Eb Sonata full justice, matching Brahms’s subtle phrasing with some beautifully graded nuances of dynamic.

It’s hard to imagine the world without this piece (and its companions); hearing it played as musically as this made one all the more thankful for it.

Some well-planned links shaped the rest of the programme.

First up came Three Romances Op.22 (‘lush & poignant’ in the words of one critic) by Clara Schumann, whose long friendship with Brahms is another memorable episode in music history.

And first up in the second half was Charles Stanford’s 1911 Sonata for Clarinet & Piano Op.129, a work deeply influenced by Brahms but distinctive especially in its slow movement, a ‘caoine’ (pronounced ‘keen’) or Irish lament.

To give his partner a ‘lip-break’ Julian contributed a vivid solo item in each half, four skazki or folktales by Medtner in the first, and in the second David Branson’s Runic Tale of 1943.

The latter’s sharp-edged harmonies were just what was needed by way of contrast, and led perfectly into Joseph Horovitz’s Sonatina of 1981 – an ebullient, jazz-inflected work that closed out the evening in high spirits, to warm acclaim.

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