ASQ Concludes “Virtual” Brahms Cycle

According to my archives, the Alexander String Quartet (ASQ) made video recordings of performances of all three of the string quartets composed by Johannes Brahms this past June 12. These were the two Opus 51 quartets, the first in C minor and the second in A minor, and the Opus 67 quartet in B-flat major. Paul Yarbrough was still the violist for this session, prior to his replacement by David Samuel. The violinists were Zakarias Grafilo and Frederick Lifsitz, and the cellist was Sandy Wilson. They also recorded a string quartet transcription of the second of the Opus 118 short pieces for piano that Brahms composed late in his life in 1893, which had been prepared by Grafilo.

The Opus 51 videos, along with the Opus 118 “encore,” were streamed by San Francisco Performances later that month as part of the Sanctuary Series programming. Last night the Morrison Chamber Music Center of the College of Liberal & Creative Arts at San Francisco State University streamed the Opus 67 quartet to launch the virtual incarnation of this season’s Morrison Artists Series, now known as the Jane H. Galante Concert Series. The Opus 118 transcription was again included as an encore. The video has now been uploaded to YouTube and will be available for viewing through February 1.

Given how much chamber music Brahms composed, it is a bit surprising that the string quartet genre was never quite in his comfort zone. Indeed, Opus 67 is the only one of the three in which the listener is provided with a clear and imaginative account of thematic exposition and development. It also happens to offer one of the most inventively engaging viola parts in the entire quartet repertoire going all the way back to Joseph Haydn. If this video recording amounted to a “farewell” gesture from Yarbrough, then he definitely went out in style.

Indeed, the elaborate structures of interplay among all four of the instrumentalists has many retrospective qualities. However, rather than reflecting on the proliferation of inventions to be found in the full canon of string quartets by Ludwig van Beethoven, Brahms leap-frogged over both Beethoven and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, turning instead to the even more prolific inventions of Haydn. The clarity with which ASQ unfolded those inventions, along with the visual cues that enhanced that clarity, made this video a particularly satisfying experience of seldom-performed music. Those unfamiliar with any of the Brahms quartets would do well to view this video for an engaging “first contact” encounter.