The members of the Alexander String Quartet: Zakarias Grafilo, Frederick Lifsitz, Paul Yarbrough, and Sandy Wilson (photograph by Rory Earnshaw, from the ASQ Web site)
At the end of this past June, Foghorn Classics released its latest album of the Alexander String Quartet (ASQ), consisting of violinists Zakarias Grafilo and Frederick Lifsitz, violist Paul Yarbrough, and cellist Sandy Wilson. Readers that keep up with ASQ news probably know by now that Yarbrough has retired, and the violist is now David Samuel. However, this new recording is based on a a recital that ASQ gave at the end of September, 2013. The recital was the first free concert in the 58th season of the Morrison Artists Series at San Francisco State University.
The recital featured clarinetist Eli Eban as guest artist in performances of the best-known quintets for clarinet and string quartet, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 581 in A major and Johannes Brahms’ Opus 115 in B minor. Those selections also served as the program for the new album (with the same clarinetist). Those familiar with these quintets will appreciate that this is an album of contrasts. K. 581 makes it clear that Mozart did not have to be sitting behind a piano keyboard to play the role of the show-off kid (even if Mozart had advanced to his thirties by the time he wrote the quintet). Mozart clearly appreciated the widely different sonorities associated with the clarinet’s different measures. By exploiting those differences, the clarinet, itself, emerged as a show-off kid in the face of the four string players.
Opus 115, on the other hand, was a product of Brahms’ melancholia. He had decided to give up composing. However, he was so impressed by the talent of clarinetist Richard Mühlfeld that his creative juices began to flow again. Opus 115 was composed in 1891, following close on the heels of the Opus 114 trio for clarinet, cello, and piano in A minor. These would then be followed in 1894 by the Opus 120 set of two sonatas for clarinet and piano in F minor and E-flat major, respectively.
Both ASQ and Eban provide technically skilled accounts of both of these quintets on this new recording. However, while they consistently do justice to all of the marks on paper, one would be hard pressed to recognize the undercurrent of emotional dispositions behind either of these two performances. Given that there are numerous recordings of both quintets involving a wide variety of interpretative performances, I found myself disappointed that all of the technical polish had not been applied to more expressive foundations. So many ASQ performances have so much to say about the music being performed that it was hard to avoid coming away with the feeling that both Mozart and Brahms deserved better.
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