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Today at the Banff International String Quartet Competition, which I'm watching livestream, the other five competitors who didn't play yesterday got their turns to play one Haydn quartet and one work from the 21st century.
The Haydns spanned the range of aesthetic approach. The Cong Quartet (so named because they're from Hong Kong - I guess if they spelled it "Kong" people would think they were from Skull Island) played Op. 33/2, known as the "Joke" Quartet for its infamous fake-out ending, and they played it jokily. They got into the rhythmic swing of the work, all the way through and not just in the finale, and found the lively Haydn spirit there. The Poeisis Quartet in Op. 71/2 also caught the playfulness and spark of the music, though their approach was not especially witty, unlike the Cong or yesterday's Nerida.
The other three were more serious. Quartet KAIRI brought crispness and clarity to Op. 74/1. Their playing was rich, smooth, and resonant, even buttery. The Arete Quartet played the relatively early Op. 20/2 as if it were less a Sturm & Drang work than a Baroque one, clean and elegant, the more so as it has a fugue for a finale, here hushed and intricate. But by far the most serious-minded, sober and plain performance was Quatuor Magenta (pronounced MAH-zhen-tah - they're French) in Op. 76/3. This is the "Emperor" Quartet, the one whose slow movement is variations on a Haydn theme written as a hymn to the Holy Roman Emperor, and which eventually became "Deutschland über alles," as a result of which hardly anyone plays the quartet any more. So due credit to a French ensemble - of four women, yet - for taking it up.
Of the 21st century works, none really appealed to me, though at least they all sounded different, unlike the last festival where they all seemed much of a muchness. The most enjoyable was the Cong's performance of Quartet No. 7 by Lawrence Dillon. A clever and strongly rhythmic work, with lots of whining calls for individual instruments above the chattering of the group. Something similar was the case with Magenta in Pascal Dusapin's Quartet No. 5 - yes, that's the third time this piece has come up in two days. Magenta's rendition seemed more haunting and abstract than the Elmire's yesterday.
Kairi did Floral Fairy by Toshio Hosokawa, which put a wispy sound with lots of harmonics at the service of an abrupt, random, detached style that was far too reminiscent of Webern. This is the sort of modernism that I'd hoped was dead by now. And I can't say much more for Many Many Cadences by Sky Macklay, from Poeisis. With some variances later on, this consists of an endless repetition of a jerky descending motif ending in the tonic, so yeah it's a cadence though it doesn't approach it through a conventional harmonic sequence. And even less for the Arete's choice of Jörg Widmann's Hunting Quartet, which we also heard yesterday, the only difference being that, for this work requiring waving bows around a lot, the Arete's violins and viola, unlike yesterday's Viatores, stood up to play this piece.
Next up is a round from the romantic-era repertoire, with the nine quartets playing seven different pieces. This will also be spread over two days, but I probably won't write it up until it finishes on Thursday.
The Haydns spanned the range of aesthetic approach. The Cong Quartet (so named because they're from Hong Kong - I guess if they spelled it "Kong" people would think they were from Skull Island) played Op. 33/2, known as the "Joke" Quartet for its infamous fake-out ending, and they played it jokily. They got into the rhythmic swing of the work, all the way through and not just in the finale, and found the lively Haydn spirit there. The Poeisis Quartet in Op. 71/2 also caught the playfulness and spark of the music, though their approach was not especially witty, unlike the Cong or yesterday's Nerida.
The other three were more serious. Quartet KAIRI brought crispness and clarity to Op. 74/1. Their playing was rich, smooth, and resonant, even buttery. The Arete Quartet played the relatively early Op. 20/2 as if it were less a Sturm & Drang work than a Baroque one, clean and elegant, the more so as it has a fugue for a finale, here hushed and intricate. But by far the most serious-minded, sober and plain performance was Quatuor Magenta (pronounced MAH-zhen-tah - they're French) in Op. 76/3. This is the "Emperor" Quartet, the one whose slow movement is variations on a Haydn theme written as a hymn to the Holy Roman Emperor, and which eventually became "Deutschland über alles," as a result of which hardly anyone plays the quartet any more. So due credit to a French ensemble - of four women, yet - for taking it up.
Of the 21st century works, none really appealed to me, though at least they all sounded different, unlike the last festival where they all seemed much of a muchness. The most enjoyable was the Cong's performance of Quartet No. 7 by Lawrence Dillon. A clever and strongly rhythmic work, with lots of whining calls for individual instruments above the chattering of the group. Something similar was the case with Magenta in Pascal Dusapin's Quartet No. 5 - yes, that's the third time this piece has come up in two days. Magenta's rendition seemed more haunting and abstract than the Elmire's yesterday.
Kairi did Floral Fairy by Toshio Hosokawa, which put a wispy sound with lots of harmonics at the service of an abrupt, random, detached style that was far too reminiscent of Webern. This is the sort of modernism that I'd hoped was dead by now. And I can't say much more for Many Many Cadences by Sky Macklay, from Poeisis. With some variances later on, this consists of an endless repetition of a jerky descending motif ending in the tonic, so yeah it's a cadence though it doesn't approach it through a conventional harmonic sequence. And even less for the Arete's choice of Jörg Widmann's Hunting Quartet, which we also heard yesterday, the only difference being that, for this work requiring waving bows around a lot, the Arete's violins and viola, unlike yesterday's Viatores, stood up to play this piece.
Next up is a round from the romantic-era repertoire, with the nine quartets playing seven different pieces. This will also be spread over two days, but I probably won't write it up until it finishes on Thursday.
