A Disappointing Chamber Music Tuesday

Last night in the Barbro Osher Recital Hall, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music presented the final installment of Chamber Music Tuesday for the academic year. Violinist Benjamin Beilman appeared as guest artist to perform in all three selections. Unfortunately, early into the performance of the final selection on the program, Antonín Dvořák’s Opus 65 (third) piano trio in F minor, one of his strings snapped.

This was far from my first encounter with this difficulty, reminding the listener that the very sound of the violin is due to the wear-and-tear brought about by the bow. (That first encounter took place during my student days in Cambridge, Massachusetts.) Nevertheless, the preceding performances of Gabriella Smith’s “Sanguinem” for solo violin (receiving its West Coast premiere) and Felix Mendelssohn’s Opus 87 (second) string quintet in B-flat minor had left me so disappointed that I had little patience to wait for Beilman to restring his instrument. Fortunately, one can take one’s leave from a livestream without calling attention to oneself!

Benjamin Beilman, Suni Norman, William Laney, Janet Yang, and Pei-Ling Lin (screen shot from last night’s streamed performance)

I suspect that my disappointment had much to do with the fact that Beilman never really connected with the other four Mendelssohn players. He seemed more interested in his own part than in leading the rest of the group. I might even conjecture that, to some extent, Faculty Viola Pei-Ling Lin had some hand in guiding the rest of the crew, so to speak. Nevertheless, it was clear that further guidance was required to advance students Suni Norman (violin), Janet Yang (viola), and William Laney (cello) from accounting for the notes to making music. Was Beilmann’s broken string a not-so-subtle warning from the Chamber Music Gods?