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Phillip T Young Recital Hall
August 8, 2011
Just ten days after Schubert's death, a large quantity of his unpublished manuscripts were sold as a job lot to Diabelli & Co. Among them was the score of his String Quintet, D.956 (which he had already offered to his publisher Probst), yet the work was not played until 1850 and not published until 1853, at which time it was designated Op.163. (The publication date is either 1853 or 1883, depending on whom you consult. Wikipedia, evidently wishing to have it both ways, says 1853 in its introduction to the work, and 1883 a few paragraphs later.) Today, the use of that opus number - particularly, as it often is, as "Op. post." - seems like an unnecessarily cruel reminder of Schubert's neglect during his all-too-short lifetime.
Monday night's concert closed with the Lafayette String Quartet, celebrating twenty-five years together, joining forces with bassist Gary Karr for a unique performance of the quintet.
The quintet is already unusual in utilising a second cello rather than a second viola (as Mozart and Beethoven had done); playing the second cello part on the bass might seem a fairly natural experiment. Except...Schubert does not use the second cello merely to provide a weightier foundation to the sound, and the part is just as challenging as the first cello's. Few bassists could even attempt to negotiate its difficulties, fewer still could succeed.
But this was clearly not meant as a circus act, rather as a serious musical proposition and so it should be treated as such.
On the plus side, the deeper resonance of the bass, even when playing the same notes as a cello, added a real "heft" to the sound, an extra gravity in certain passages, an almost orchestral tone, which was particularly successful in the scherzo, giving it an earthier feel than is usual.
On the minus side, it must be admitted that the famous second subject of the first movement, played as a duet by the cellos and constituting one of the most sublime passages in the entire chamber music literature, did not quite come off, no matter how well played - and it was; this passage was written for two instruments of near-identical acoustic characteristics and can only make its full effect when played so. (Although, bizarrely, when Schubert alludes to this passage in the finale, it was clearer than usual.)
Having dealt with the sound, how was the actual performance?
In a word: superb.
The work's introduction, for quartet (Schubert holds back the second cello for a little) was luminous, and the extra weight of the bass when it did appear signalled that this was to be a performance of distinction.
The slow movement is one of the greatest in all music and was given a tremendously concentrated performance; the pizzicato duet between first violin and bass was quite lovely and so intimate in feeling that one half expected the other three players to offer to leave Elliott-Goldschmid and Karr alone together. I have rarely heard this movement played as well, let alone better.
The scherzo's terrific energy was tempered by a very slow trio, slow and deep. The finale was taken at a fairly measured tempo and seemed all the better for it, with the second theme possessing a particularly "gemütlich" quality. And that strange ending, with its sudden semitone lurch, was as enigmatic as ever.
Whatever one felt about the use of a bass instead of a second cello, there was no question whatever that this was - to quote the VSMF motto - "chamber music of the highest order", the like of which is not heard everyday.
There are many who consider the Schubert quintet to be the greatest piece of chamber music ever composed. I don't think I'd go quite that far - although top five, certainly - but then can one really compare the Schubert with, say, Beethoven's Op.131?
Or, for that matter, Op.133?
It is well-known that Beethoven agreed to his publisher Artaria's request for a replacement finale to the Op.130 string quartet on condition that the original finale - the Grosse Fuge - be published separately, which it was, as Op.133.
What is rather less common knowledge, is that Artaria also had a piano duet arrangement prepared by one Anton Halm. Beethoven was distinctly unimpressed with Halm's arrangement, which broke up musical lines for the convenience of the players, something Beethoven himself - as Ignaz Schuppanzigh, Caroline Unger and others could have attested - steadfastly refused to do. Instead he insisted on making his own version (for which he demanded an additional fee), which was published in May 1827 as Op.134 - his last work for keyboard. (This last fact is particularly obscure and a fine question for games of musical trivia.)
Clearly, to have expended this much energy on music which was to attract such comments as "it will scarcely ever touch the heart" and "repellent if not unintelligible", Beethoven must have cared deeply about the Grosse Fuge.
As well he might: here, as I believe I have remarked before, is Beethoven anticipating Liszt's aim of "throwing a lance into the future", and the future is still, in many ways trying to catch up.
The Grosse Fuge is "absolute" music with a vengeance, Beethoven obsessively working through the logic of the fugal process with blunt disregard for any niceties: one can almost hear him saying "I don't care whether you can play it and I don't care if it sounds 'ugly!'"
Monday night's performance may, at its very opening, have sounded less cataclysmic than some others I have known; that soon changed. The feeling of immense power under restraint in the "overture" was most impressive; but, perhaps most impressive at all, was the way in which the quartet made absolutely no attempt to beautify the sounds coming out of their instruments. The last thing this music should be is pretty. (Has anyone every suggested that Goya's Napoleonic War paintings or Picasso's Guernica would be better if they were less "ugly"?)
For some fifteen or sixteen minutes the capacity audience sat rivetted at this all-out assault on their senses (I suspect those who had not heard it before were both rapt and stunned into silence).
I was on the edge of my seat. Magnificent.
Given the uniqueness of the two major works in the programme, it was left to the opening work, Beethoven's Quartet Op.18 No.3, to demonstrate the Lafayettes' more conventional qualities.
These qualities, as was evident from the suave opening, include a rich tone, perfect balance between the instruments, remarkable unanimity of attack and phrasing, and ensemble so razor-sharp you could cut yourself on it.
As in the Schubert, the first movement repeat was omitted, but with a concert this length, I am disinclined to protest. The music was given precisely the right amount of weight throughout (not, in early Beethoven, as easy as it might sound) and I particularly enjoyed the finale, taken very quickly but with an distinct air of nonchalance.
A night to remember.
Tuesday evening's performance was every bit as fine as Monday's; the Grosse Fuge was perhaps a little smoother, a little more homogeneous, and I know some people found this made the music easier to "get". I preferred the greater sense of cosmic struggle on Monday.
The Schubert, on the other hand, if anything dug just a little deeper, especially in the slow movement and finale.
There was, though, very little to choose between the two concerts; I feel privileged to have been able to attend both.
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