MiV Home
First Metropolitan United Church
June 10, 2018
Say what you will about Robert Schumann (and people, particularly Wagner, have), nobody can deny that he was a man who did not do things by halves: when he devoted himself to a particular musical form, he really devoted himself.
Hence 1840, the Year of Lieder; 1841, the Year of Symphonies; and 1842, the Year of Chamber Music.
It is instructive, in this regard, to examine some of the entries in his "household book" for 1842:
You certainly cannot accuse Schumann of skimping on his homework, either.
Schumann worked on the first two of his Op.41 quartets simultaneously, then proceeded to the third; all three were completed within the space of five weeks and dedicated "To his friend Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy".
After which, Schumann never wrote again for strings alone; all of his subsequent chamber music employs his own instrument, the piano.
The Ariel String Quartet closed the first half of their Eine Kleine Summer Music recital, which opened this year's festival, with a splendid performance of the second of the Op.41 quartets, the F major.
The opening movement, cast in sumptuous tone colours — as, indeed, was the entire performance — was both ardent and thoroughly persuasive (not, for me, always the case with Schumann).
The quaintly titled Andante quasi variazioni (why "quasi", one wonders, as it truly is a theme-and-variations movement) was delicious and featured some big, but not extreme, dynamic contrasts.
I was really taken with the bounce and intensity the Ariels brought to the scherzo, in which "volatility" seemed to be the keyword. The trio was marvellously playful.
The finale was a dancing rondo, exuberantly forceful in places, but not inappropriately.
This was some of the finest Schumann chamber playing I have heard in quite some time.
I wish I could be as enthusiastic about their performance of the opening work, Mozart's G major quartet, K.387.
Although there were many praiseworthy attributes of their playing — excellent tone, immaculate ensemble and rapport between the players — there were also aspects which seemed less than appropriate: somewhat exaggerated accents in the opening movement and a tendency to be too forceful throughout: as I jotted (somewhat ungrammatically) in my notebook: "LvB [i.e. Beethoven] it ain't".
I very much liked the close of the first movement, all feline grace, but overall there was, for my taste, too much force and too little elegance on display.
A pity.
To compound the pity, ill-health forced me to leave at the interval, thus missing what, going by the first half, was likely to prove the best of the afternoon, Brahms' Op.51 No.2.
MiV Home