After some 30 years of music-making to rave reviews, yet another review of the venerable Emerson Sting Quartet seems redundant. Perhaps more interesting is a closer examination of what makes the foursome artistically indivisible.
In their 13th appearance as guests of the Friends of Chamber Music, the ensemble is at home here among a loyal following of admiring chamber music devotees. Yet the terminology itself reveals little about the context and content of this form of music.
Generally-speaking, “chamber music” implies an intimate setting in which a small group of musicians perform in close proximity to their audience. But what is it about the musicians themselves that compels them to prefer such a demanding mode of musicianship?
What is the raison d’etre that inspires four individuals to engage in an intensely challenging marriage of distinct temperaments and unique artistic sensibilities that are routinely exposed and scrutinized in innumerable, often grueling hours of rehearsal?
For violinists Philip Setzer and Eugene Drucker, violist Lawrence Dutton and cellist David Finckel, the answer to transcending the limits of ensemble playing arguably lies in their collective commitment to place equal emphasis on the intelligence, physical effect and emotional connotation of each note that passes among them.
Their powerful chemistry was most evident in Franz Schubert’s String Quartet in D minor, D. 810 (“Death and the Maiden”).
The four-movement workout for musicians and audience alike is an ideal canvas on which to observe the Emerson’s principled playing, as well as each member’s close connection to the others” real time moments of inspiration. Never on mere autopilot, the foursome maintains a spirit of purity, clarity and novelty in their interpretations of music across genres.
With Finckel in the spotlight in the Andante movement, the other players supported his smooth melodies just as thoughtfully and passionately as when they came together in perfect parallel motion to deliver an exhilarating conclusion.
The program opened with the quartet on solid footing in Haydn’s often delicate String Quartet in F Major, Op. 74, No. 2, followed by von Webern’s brief and breezy Six Bagatelles, Op. 9. Here, the quartet expressed through music the meaning of a glance, a greeting or a gesture that – in daily life – might go unnoticed.
Also on the substantial program was Prokofiev’s String Quartet No. 1 in B minor, Op. 50, a masterpiece in which the Emerson proved their brilliant sense of lyricism and a common mischievousness energy.
