San Francisco Classical Voice

From the intimacy of Mozart to the dense gestures of Augusta Read Thomas to the orchestral monumentality of Brahms, the Avalon Quartet on Sunday in Stanford's Dinkelspiel Auditorium traveled across not only a broad swath of chamber music history but also a world of different textures and sounds. A distinct and individual idea of what a small ensemble of strings might do underlay each of the three works on the program, and the Avalon unfolded the special qualities of each with great sensitivity and subtlety.

Even aside from the sheer variety of the program and the utter beauty of the music, the concert offered two fine treats. The first was the rare opportunity to hear two viola quintets. The addition of a second viola to the traditional string quartet offers a different array of sonorities, as Mozart explored in his String Quintet in G minor, K. 516. The second was a passionate and impeccably crafted and conceived new quartet, Fugitive Star (2000), written for and dedicated to the Avalon Quartet by the young but by no means unknown Augusta Read Thomas.

Like much that Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart did, his viola quintets (1787) lie between the genres of his day. If the players converse as equals, as was the 18th century ideal in chamber music, they also sing with all the expressive melodies and gestures of opera.

Using the dark hue of the added viola to great advantage, Mozart wrote a work famous for its somber intensity and expressive breadth. With Philip Setzer in the seat of second viola, moonlighting from his usual job as violinist in the Emerson Quartet, the Avalon Quartet brought out all the subtleties of phrase that make chamber music so gloriously intimate and sublime. Each gesture was wrought with an ear to its neighbor so that the voices parleyed into elegant and haunting effects.

Excessive subtlety, however, can become too much of a good thing. While avoiding descent into mannerism, the group never broke through the surface of elegance into the passion of opera. Nuances sometimes need the shock of unbridled energy, if only to turn control into resignation. While individual phrases were delicately handled, they never added up to something greater than the sum of the parts, perhaps because of varying interpretive ideals among the performers. While the violas and cello played with energy, the second violin was retiring and the first violin distant from the group in its search for beauty. The players thus hovered uncomfortably between the subtlety of chamber music and the energy of opera.

Though only eight minutes in length, Augusta Read Thomas' Fugitive Star was the high point of the program. It is not only a stunning piece but was stunningly played, this time by the Avalon Quartet alone. The work is simple and direct, stretching as a single gesture from beginning to end. It profited from the timbral breadth of the Avalon, and their commitment to the work is understandable. (The Caramoor International Music Festival commissioned the work to be played by the Avalon Quartet, and it premiered in July 2000. Thomas (b. 1964) is currently professor of composition at the Eastman School of Music.)

Setzer rejoined the quartet after intermission for Brahms' String Quintet in G Major, Op. 111 (1891). Like Mozart, Brahms used the extra viola to indulge in complex motivic play between the instruments. But where Mozart used the interplay as a conversation, Brahms turned it into massive, almost orchestral sound. The players balanced the mass of sound with sensuous color and fine nuances in the broad gestures.

The work allowed the players to show their individual strengths, from the sweet and languid melodies of Blaise Magnière (violin 1), to the energetic motivic play of Marie Wang (violin 2), to the driving surety of line and fire of Anthea Kreston (viola 1), to the sensitive ease of phrase of Philip Setzer (viola 2), to the powerful bass and sense of balance of Jason Duckles (cello). Their shared sensuousness of tone and attention to detail showed Brahms at his best.

The award-winning Avalon Quartet, formed in 1995, begins this year a three-year appointment at Harvard University. The characters and styles of the four musicians differ, at times markedly. The vibrato could be matched better — the slow vibrato of the first violin did not fit with the intensity of the other players. But such details failed to impede their producing a spirited performance.

They are willing to take risks and are accomplished enough to succeed. Philip Setzer melded into the group seamlessly and with ease, his playing never betraying the fact that the Avalon currently works with Setzer and the Emerson Quartet at the Hartt School of Music. The Avalon, not Setzer, set the game, communicating its pleasure in the music with finesse, warmth, and conviction.

(Keith Chapin is a violist and a Ph.D. candidate in musicology at Stanford University.)

©2001 Keith Chapin, all rights reserved