Diana Doherty and The Streeton Trio | Adelaide Festival 2021 review

Martinu’s Oboe Quartet, for years the only major work for oboe and piano trio, grew in stature with this focused performance.

Diana Doherty and the Streeton Trio. Picture Christie Brewster

Diana Doherty and The Streeton Trio

Classical Music / AUS

FESTIVAL

Adelaide Town Hall

Until March 3

Virtuoso oboist Diana Doherty is a force of nature. Her personal flair and energising engagement gives listeners an immersive experience that goes beyond mere excellence.

And so Martinu’s Oboe Quartet, for years the only major work for oboe and piano trio, grew in stature with the players’ spacious, unfussed but focused performance.

Tonally an oboe lends an edgy punch to piano, violin and cello, and Doherty’s delicate, lightly projected sonics gave a convincing sheen to the ensemble in the bright and breezy first movement, the gritty Adagio, with the skittish and brilliantly ebullient final section completing the picture.

Fine players all, the Streeton Trio took on Mendelssohn’s evergreen Piano Trio No. 1 with considerable success in its first three movements.

The especially popular opening with its dramatic eloquence delicately balanced against Schubertian charm was given a disarmingly direct and uncluttered reading.

The Streetons produced real poetry in the Andante and glitter in the Scherzo. But without Doherty’s electric presence the white heat of Mendelssohn’s tempestuous Finale was missing.

In its world premiere, Lachlan Skipworth’s Oboe Quartet (2020) made for compelling listening.

A riposte to some of the 20th century’s more alienating styles its unapologetically thematic, emotional and often rapturous moments were beguiling and the clear narrative and programmatic content will doubtless prove enticing in today’s troubled times.

Skipworth writes from the heart, the music sounding admirably original and by no means derivative.