San Francisco Classical Voice

Most gratifying was the Walton, a youthful work incorporating obvious influences of great turn-of-the-century composers and only intermittently representing the complexity and abrasiveness that he often favored in his later music. Debussy and Ravel figure most prominently in this teenager's pantheon, thankfully, for their delicacy played into the most obvious strengths of Sunday's quartet: judicious blend and solid rhythm. These attributes prevailed throughout the entire afternoon. The frequent tremolos were dead-on unanimous and incisive, and the harmonics were graciously integrated into the collective sound. The dissonant, Bartókian romp in the final movement was not quite savage because it was so beautifully tuned, rounding out some of the aggression. Aside from a couple of brief solos in the last movement where Gindele and violist John Largess let loose with a welcome, full-throated tone, the foursome seemed most successful in a shimmering Impressionistic partnership of great skill and mutual consideration.

And so it went, in fact, with the major work on the program, the Brahms Quartet in G minor, Opus 25. Where a little more ripe Romantic individualism might have helped, the players consistently demurred to the balance of ensemble. Wang's piano here seemed too restrained much of the time, but she was always direct and clear. The same held with the string players: in the contrasting agitato midsection of the third movement, for instance; there wasn't quite enough electricity or pain as the Miró players punctuated Wang's grand phrases.

On the other hand, the benefits of this approach deflected any quibbles: the passionate movement became a soaring arc of melody, drawing to a deeply satisfying, contented close. The last movement, meanwhile, was equally remarkable and well judged. The group displayed plenty of gypsy fire, with a quick tempo and breathtakingly precise ensemble.

The Mozart Quartet in E-flat Major, K.493 is by contrast more of a pianist's show than the Brahms, and Wang was dazzlingly nimble and energetic, especially in the first movement. Yet here again she was always elegant in touch and dynamics, sensitive to the partnership. Similarly, violinist Daniel Ching shone with assured intonation, never overloading the ensemble with his leading part. Classicism seemed to suit the quartet as well as Impressionism, with nary a sign of excess — the splendid phrasing and clarity ingratiating rather than spotlit, the tempi a bit on the quick side most of the time but never hasty.

One of the few strange things in this concert of relatively familiar music and well-integrated music making, however, was how remarkably different this group sounded in the brief moments where the piano fell silent — such as in the last movement of the Brahms. The Miró Quartet (on this occasion without second violinist Sandy Yamamoto) has made a name for itself in part because of exquisite technical skill and ensemble. They delivered all of that on Sunday, but lacking was a real polish of sound such as one expects from three players so used to playing together. Here is a group that even plays on a matched set of new instruments, made for them by a single French luthier — from a single tree, as far as I know — yet somehow little distinctive could be said about their approach to ensemble sound other than a pleasant, almost demur inability to get in each other's way.

When left to themselves as a threesome, however, the Miró strings sometimes really resonated with a corporate sound. The requisite richness and the unanimity of vibrato that one expects from the best string ensembles momentarily emerged. It was as if their careful attention to the piano, or those big under- and overtones, distracted the players ever so slightly from the business of being a really top-flight string group. I hope to hear them again by themselves to hear the difference, despite the evident fine results they displayed on Sunday with a like-minded, equally musical pianist.