The Brook Street Band
83:44
First Hand Records FHR188
Joseph Gibbs was lucky enough to have been painted by his friend and fellow musician Thomas Gainsborough, a fine portrait reproduced in this CD case, while the programme notes by Tatty Theo, the group’s cellist, perhaps rather ungenerously suggest that it is this association with greatness that has saved Gibbs’ music from obscurity. In fact, although he lived to the ripe old age of 89, he only seems to have published one further collection of music, a set of quartets, and remained a composer of only parochial importance. This seems a shame as these opus 1 Sonatas seem much more than merely competent, and in these sympathetic and imaginative performances by the Brook Street Band they emerge as fine compositions in their own right. The group’s violinist Rachel Harris brings her extensive understanding of the music of this period to bear on Gibbs’ felicitous melodic lines and rhetorical phrases to bring out his unique musical voice. It seems sad that the compositional potential of these promising works was never really fulfilled – perhaps the highly competitive milieu of London at the time, which produced so many masterpieces, was something which Gibbs chose to avoid, preferring local celebrity to an international reputation. In any case, it is lovely to have some fine music persuasively played as a soundtrack to Gainsborough’s vivid portrait of his friend.
D. James Ross