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First Unitarian Church
June 16, 2019
Antonin Dvorák wrote a considerable amount of chamber music, including fourteen string quartets, three string quintets, a string sextet, four piano trios, two piano quartets, two piano quintets, the fabulous bagatelles for string quartet and harmonium (actually played at an Eine Kleine Summer Music a couple of decades ago), works for violin and piano, for cello and piano, and even (oh, I really want to hear this) a set of fanfares for four trumpets and timpani.
And yet, for some reason, only a handful of them are regularly featured on concert programmes, most commonly the "American" quartet, the "Dumky" piano trio and the (second) piano quintet.
Having managed to successfully mis-read both the series publicity material and the programme, I was somewhat taken aback when the musicians walked onto the stage for the final work of Sunday's excellent Eine Kleine concert (the second in this year's season) and I realised that violinist Julian Vitek was not carrying his instrument, but was there to turn the pages for pianist Lorraine Min.
A rapid re-examination of the programme revealed that perhaps it is time to have my eyes tested again, for the work about to be played was not, as I had fondly imagined, Dvorák's Piano Quintet in A, Op.81, but the Piano Quartet No.2 in E flat, Op.87.
It also came as something not unakin to a shock to realise that, insofar as I can recall, I had never heard the quartet before.
The declamatory opening bars may not have been typical Dvořák but what followed left the composer's identity in no doubt whatsoever. The movement is marked allegro con fuoco and Min, Terence Tam, Kenji Fusé and Lorraine Backstrom took that to heart, this was indeed a fiery reading, although the delicious viola-led second subject gave a temporary respite from the drama. Dvořák did seem to have a certain amount of difficulty in ending the movement though, his sheer inventiveness perhaps getting the better of him.
The slow movement opens with a glorious cello melody, superbly played by Backstrom, and was intensely lyrical, although there was turbulence at the centre. The delightfully lilting third movement invokes the cimbalom — an Eastern European form of hammered dulcimer employed by, inter alia, Bartók, Kodály and Stravinsky — and its trio seems to summon up the rhythmic pattern of the finale of Schubert's "Death and the Maiden" quartet. Whether or not this was a conscious gesture in Franz's direction I could not say.
The finale opened in jolly fashion and the composer's playful side is to the fore, one could almost hear him saying "hang spring cleaning! let's have some fun". Once again he seemed reluctant to allow the music to finish, although the actual ending was unmistakably final.
While it would be futile to suggest that this quartet will ever supplant my personal favourite chamber works by Dvořák (mainly the obvious ones I'm afraid, although I surely do love the Bagatelles), perhaps because it lacks any earworms among its main themes, this was nevertheless a first-rate performance which came close to achieving what I suspect to be, in this case, the impossible.
I was not the only person who found themselves in some confusion over Sunday's programme, although at least some of my confusion was entirely of my own making. However, it transpired that not only was the previously-announced sequence of music different from that contained in the programme, but that what was actually performed was in yet another order and, in the case of the Schubert, included a different work altogether.
Let us, then, consider the rest of the music strictly in performance-order.
The afternoon opened with two Fantasie Quintets by Elinor Dunsmuir. These recently-discovered scores were probably, we are told, composed during the 1920s, in which case we can safely say that Elinor was no slave to the avant-garde: harmonically-speaking she ventured no further than Elgar in his own Piano Quintet, composed in 1918. Elgar was, though, almost three decades older than Dunsmuir and, by the 1920s, was seen as distinctly old-fashioned in outlook.
All of which, with the benefit of almost a century's hindsight, matters not one whit. Dunsmuir's music may not have been breaking new ground, but was it worth spending the time listening to, even without the local associations?
My answer to this question would be categorically in the affirmative. Both quintets, the second receiving its first public performance, were undeniably late-Romantic in outlook and clearly the product of an accomplished musical mind.
The Music Ensemble played them to the hilt, with not even the slight hint of condescension, which was entirely appropriate. Indeed, the lushness of the sound they produced would, I suspect, have delighted Elinor as much as it clearly delighted Sunday's audience.
These pieces perhaps lacked the ultimate in memorability — I doubt if anybody at the interval found themselves humming the main themes — but they certainly made at least one listener only too keen to here more of Dunsmuir's music.
The change in the programme I must say I regretted. We were promised Schubert's Adagio and Rondo Concertante D.487, his first chamber music for piano and strings, (another) work with which I can confidently claim complete unfamiliarity.
In the event, perhaps for reasons of timing, the music was replaced with the far better known Notturno, D.897 for piano trio.
Once again I must make a confession: I have distinctly ambivalent feelings towards Schubert's piano trios. Normally, I very much enjoy his "heavenly lengths", but in the piano trios, for me, his sheer inventiveness seems to have got the better of him and he never included just one thematic idea when two (or even three) had occurred to him. A lesser composer might well have decided to keep those extra ideas for other works, but Schubert must have been well aware that there would be another great tune along in a minute, so why not use these while they were in his head?
Having said which, and while observing that as the piece is in extended ternary form ("ABABA") he could easily have left out the final "BA", I will also admit that the piece was gorgeously played by Min, Tam and Backstrom; their basic tempo was quite slow yet the music never dragged; the final word in my notebook regarding the work can, I think, stand for the entire performance: "lovely".
Only one of Sunday's composers was actually present in the flesh, Victoria's Stephen Brown, to hear what I believe was the first public performance of any part of his Piano Quintet No.2, "White Light White Heat".
In the event, what we heard was the central, third, movement marked moderato con moto.
Although the quintet was inspired by the music of Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground, that most seminal of all late-60s rock bands, Brown disguises his source material well; so well, in fact, that I was embarrassed to discover, when I asked him which songs he had used as melodic sources, that not only had I been familiar with both songs (and had, in fact, heard Reed sing both in person in the early 1970s in London), I had actually performed one of them myself numerous times in public — as several of those present on Sunday could, but were far too polite to, testify.
I suspect that the aggressive nature of some of the movements which were not played might have been too much for a languid summer's afternoon in Prospect Lake, but this movement, around quarter-of-an-hour in length and decidedly lyrical in nature, was a definite audience favourite. And deservedly so.
The Muses (if I may) played it with dedication and conviction, from the delicate opening, with the two violins weaving filigree patterns over the piano's arpeggios, to the equally delicate close, with harmonics and delicious descending string glissandos.
Stephen Brown's unbroken record — I have yet to hear a piece of his which I did not enjoy — was effortlessly maintained, aided, in no small part, by the quality of the performance.
In sum, even though the programme was not quite what I was anticipating, nor in the order I was expecting, I enjoyed every minute.
Another exceptional afternoon's music-making at Eine Kleine Summer Music.
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