San Francisco Classical Voice

The Takács [tock-atch] has unusual qualities. Named for Hungarian composer Jenö Takács and founded by four Budapest music students in 1975, this group has made a special case in cycles of Bartók and Brahms for the common ground of that music. Recent excursions into Schubert and Beethoven have argued the same case there. Paradoxically, this ensemble is as little-concerned with homogeneity as any quartet I can remember. They seem more concerned with the power of a musical idea than the mere cohesion of a musical sound. Other quartets offer perfect lines of parallel longitude. The Takács offer a dizzying topography.

At the same moment, they have sonic identity. How do they do it? The answer, bridging these powerful individual personalities, lies within.

The second violin, Károly Schranz, has a unique tonal function, and I don't know that I have ever heard anyone handle his role as he does. It is a question of timbre. Much of this Beethoven sees the second violin in conversation with the first, or with the viola. Rarely does it speak with the cello. What Schranz does that I found so surprising is that he becomes chameleon. When partnering with the viola, his instrument became dark, woody, introspective. It audibly changed color. When with the first? All brilliance, silver, and shining. I stared at this for some while, trying to reason it out. Apart from a drop in his bow-wrist position when in viola mode, and a raising of it in violin, I could not tell how he accomplished this.

Two further matters of sound: they play in a very flat arc, sitting first, second, cello, and viola from left to right. Both first (Edward Dusinberre, a Briton) and viola (Roger Tapping, another) sat on benches, so to give even more line-of-sight to their colleagues. They also appear to play long stretches of this repertoire from memory, allowing intimate contact (over very low music stands) throughout.

In Beethoven's Quartet in D, Op 18, No 3 (1799), they opened with a hushed mystery, and then soon were pulsing with the kineticism which trademarked the entire performance. Honoring their central European origins, they often used recurring up-up bowings. This gives an etched and exceedingly clean sound, and allowed greater expressive freedom at the margins. The perfect unisons of the next two movements, the heightened pianissimi, the sweet intensity of this Viennese music was a captivation. In the final movement, taken presto and then some, is a saltarello, a leaping dance which the Takács grasped completely. With two Haydnesque whispers at the end, they were honored by a great laugh from the audience, shared by themselves.

The “Rasoumovsky” Op 59 No 2 (1806) mentioned earlier, was populated by startling downbeats, dashing rhythmic élan, and a willingness to employ harsh and steely sound, without vibrato at all, to coalesce a mood. It was not played perfectly. In risking so much on the outcome, some of the preliminary business was rough. Foot-stomping from the first violin was a bit much, and only the cellist (András Fejér) was completely immune to its voodoo charms. Even so, there was a tremendous sense of design and climax. Along the way, they argued about emphasis and vantage, but never about the goal.

Beethoven's masterwork, the E-Flat Major Op 127 (1825), concluded the concert. It was an encyclopaedia of everything of which this quartet is capable. It opened like a great tracker organ, the linkages evident and overwhelming. A tremendous canvas of bow techniques, alternative left-hand positions, and the highest degree of unanimity pointed the way to late Beethoven. This music of bi-polar mood, of spiritual burden and naïve horseplay, was given matching life by the multiple personalities of this ensemble. Every phrase was rounded with exquisite forethought. The third movement, Scherzando, was fearless in its eccentricity. A tiny cantus firmus lived opposite a waltz and a march, and each was every advocate's dream. (These players are advocates.) The sonata form Finale was replete with regular phrase and punctuation.

It was in the second movement, an Adagio theme with five variations, that these players entranced. Each variation occupied a whole sound-world. The 18th-century division procedures, the French military steps, the fantasia and berceuse and arioso — all of this had succinct and vivid life.

So, too, at every moment, this remarkable group.