The first track, one of Leroy Anderson's trademark light orchestral pieces, aptly describes the collection; it is "Clarinet Candy", or a collection of lollipops such as you might hear as encores at concerts. Most of them were not written for clarinet, but they sound quite at home with it.
For variety the first half of the album is the best. After the overture-like opening, there's the pop variation of Paganini's Caprice, the spectacular Benny Goodman arrangement of Chopin's "Fantasie Impromptu", followed by the calm of "Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring".
After the "Flight of the Bumble Bee" (curently being shown in video as a 1 min 20 sec appetiser on Classic FM-TV) and the tribute to Benny Goodman (actually a medley of George Gershwin tunes) the pace and tone settles down to the more mellow, with some of the pastoral melodies of such as Ravel and Tchaikovsky as well as more modern screen tunes from the likes of John Barry and Ennio Morricone.
Throughout Emma's playing is as assured as you'd expect it to be; soft or spectacular she makes it sound effortless, and the 73 minutes running time goes by far too quickly. She is well forward in the mix (turn up the volume and it's almost as if she's in the room with you) and the orchestral backing is just that, backing and unobtrusive. I'd have liked a little more sparkle and contrast in the second half of the programme, but on the whole this is very good start and might hopefully lead to more of the same soon.
