It’s hard to find three composers who contributed more to the string quartet repertoire than Haydn, Beethoven and Bartok. The American String Quartet not only opened the Buffalo Chamber Music Society’s season with that trio Tuesday evening, they gave us something to treasure by offering fine performances of Beethoven’s and Bartok’s valedictory utterances in that form.

Beethoven’s five “late quartets” cover musical ground that makes them stand apart from anything else in the literature. But the last of those five, the Quartet in F Major, Op 135, seems to speak from a realm of repose, as though Beethoven had said all he wanted in the titanic vein and was here taking a deep breath and offering a mature, reflective and measured summary of his quartet journey.

The ASQ performance reflected this meditative quality, bringing out the sly polyphony of the first movement’s thematic elements quite well, pressing a bit too hard in the Scherzo, but reaching a concert high point with the heartfelt spiritual elevation of the Adagio. The famous closing question and answer “Must it be?” seemed more labored than probing.

Unlike Beethoven’s final quartet, Bartok’s No. 6 does not reflect a poised career overview. It was written in 1939, right after his mother died and before European turmoil forced him to emigrate to America. It speaks with an effusive sadness.

Each movement springs from the same motto theme, labeled Mesto (sad), but is infused with a different kind of profound expressiveness.

The ASQ was in top form here, projecting the first movement’s disturbed ambience with searing commitment, and the quirky march of the second was rhythmically jerky but still dour and unsmiling.

So was the following jocular Burletta (burlesque), but in the ghostly and unrelieved sadness of the Finale, Bartok’s thought process was virtually audible, and the note of veiled optimism in the cello’s closing pizzicato phrase was so poignant that applause seemed irreverent.

The concert had opened with Haydn’s Quartet inGMajor, Op. 77 No. 1. It was a shining illustration of why Haydn is considered the father of the string quartet.

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American String Quartet

Presented by the Buffalo Chamber Music Society. Tuesday evening in the Mary Seaton Room of Kleinhans Music Hall.