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CHAMBER MUSIC REVIEW Balancing Elegance and Urgency September 20, 2002
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By J. M. Bailey
Three of the Bay Area's best-known period-instrument string players (Carla Moore, violin; Katherine Kyme, viola; and David Morris, cello) teamed up with fortepianist Belle Bulwinkle Friday evening for a program of (mostly) Mozart chamber music at Mills College. The playing was uniformly accomplished, but the musical results somewhat mixed — the playing beguiling in some places, rigid and rushed in others. It was a puzzling evening.
The concert began with the Divertimento in B-flat, K. 254 (Mozart's first piano trio). The opening Allegro was powerfully driven, maybe too much so; even in wistful moments the players pressed on, and solitary phrases in the keyboard part that linked one section to another were rattled off at speed, rather than shaped or given any space in which to be experienced. The second movement, marked "Adagio," was performed at a surprisingly quick pace, even given what we now know about 18th-century tempos. The tempo chosen here made for a good active Andante, and, again, left little time for reflection or even the slightest rubato in the performance. One had the impression that the players were worried that it might become tedious, so pushed through to get it over with.
But the final movement (Rondo: Tempo di menuetto) was in a true minuetto tempo, and performed with a great deal of style and wit. A number of different tone colors were employed for different musical reasons: a beautiful singing tone for the main theme, for example, but a much more vibrant tone for the more dramatic sections of the work. In this movement the pacing seemed exactly right, and phrases were given time to unfold and reveal their content, right down to the final, whimsical gesture. Throughout the concert it was the final movements that got this kind of characterful treatment, even where the other movements were more workaday.
The violin/viola Duo in G major, K. 423, introduced violist Katherine Kyme, who played throughout with a gorgeous viola tone, warm and resonant. The opening Allegro was performed at an almost perfect tempo, with a wonderful sense of poise throughout. The level of ensemble was very high, even though the players avoided falling into the duo habit of giving each other cheesy "meaningful" looks. As in the Divertimento, the Duo's Adagio went at something more like an Andante tempo, but in this case there was more internal shaping, so that the quick basic pulse did not prevent the music from breathing where it needed to. As with the first movement, the instruments were wonderfully balanced, and in passages where the viola had the melody Kyme produced a beautiful lyric tone that soared over Moore's warm accompaniment. The final Rondo was for the most part lighthearted, but with plenty of substance, and a high degree of drama in the minore section. The most unfamiliar music on the program was J.C.F. Bach's sonata for keyboard and violoncello obbligato — a work rarely performed, perhaps partly because it has one of those unforgiving cello parts which, while sounding fairly virtuosic, are a good deal harder to play than many other equally flashy works that lie much more comfortably under the fingers. I felt in the first movement that Bulwinkle was pushing the pace, making it a bit of a scramble for cellist David Morris. A technique of Morris's of pulling the bow rapidly across the strings gave a good deal of rhythmic vitality to the performance, but unfortunately became a conspicuous effect in itself. There was some excellent playing from both performers, however, and they carried off the "in medias res" ending with style. The combination of unseasonably warm weather and gut strings was perhaps the reason for some intonation problems in the upper reaches of the cello's range. The sonata's Larghetto was the only genuine "slow movement" of the evening, and as such had a gentleness and expressiveness which were both touching and uplifting. This magical performance garnered the rare tribute of absolute stillness from the audience at the end of the movement The rhapsodic finale was carried off with personality and an evident sense of humor. The final piece, the E-flat Quartet of Mozart, K 493, was the most uneven in performance. There was much fine playing, but also a tendency to rush and gloss over the faster passages in the keyboard part, which made the performance seem breathless. The piece is in many ways like a piano concerto, with many rapid, virtuosic passages for the piano, and concertante tuttis for the strings. These string passages provided some wonderful moments of stillness within the overall performance, and Carla Moore in particular produced a number of beautifully silky-toned solos in dialogue with the keyboard. As with the other Mozart works in the program, it was the final movement (Allegretto) that got the most characterful playing, and the group carried off the piece's humorous final statement with great aplomb.
(J.M. Bailey has studied and taught music in the Universities of Western Australia and Oxford, and is currently in the States pursuing further studies in music performance.)
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