Concertante explores lean repertoire
The six string players of the touring chamber ensemble Concertante offered a well-thought-out, prospectively enjoyable program Tuesday evening. Its focus was two of the finest members of the rather lean repertoire for string sextet, those by Korngold and Brahms’ Op. 36.
They had a delightful idea to open the program, a 2008 arrangement of the much lighter but absolutely charming 1892 Serenade in E minor by Elgar.
Although it was written for string orchestra, I had never heard it as a chamber work. But, as played by Concertante it was only partially successful, losing the softness of the larger string ensemble version and gaining only intimacy and intensity that did not do much for Elgar’s moods of gentle yearning, pensive melancholy and cautious exuberance.
Korngold’s 1915 Sextet in D Major has become very popular in recent decades. The first movement’s rapid exchanges of tempos and moods were reasonably well captured by the artists, whose coping with the faster tempos seemed something of a struggle. The probing slow movement’s introspection came through convincingly, but the gentle Intermezzo seemed to miss the mark, with its light sentimentality and humor lost to the performers. They got back on track in the Presto Finale, where its rollicking rhythmic pulse was exciting as were the many motifs passed back and forth like a hot potato.
In the concluding Brahms Sextet in G Major, Op. 36, the artists seemed to have an aversion to legato phrasing, and many passages that should emerge smoothly were choppy in execution.
This is not the most polished string ensemble I’ve heard, often playing with individual earnestness rather than ensemble coherence. This was most evident in the Brahms. They finally came together in the variations of the slow movement in which the ensemble found its richness. In the Finale they caught its compelling lilt, played with better balance throughout, and executed the superb fugal section cleanly to end the concert on a high note.
Concert Review
Chamber Music Society
Tuesday night in the Mary Seaton Room, Kleinhans Music Hall
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