Every musical genre has its seminal works, and among the most unsung such masterpieces in 20th-century chamber music is George Crumb’s “Black Angels.”
Not only is this 1970 piece one of the only major string quartets inspired by the Vietnam War, it also stretches the venerable form in ways never imagined before and never heard since.
It is also important because it directly inspired the formation of the Kronos Quartet, which has gone on to become the classical world’s master exponent of the new.
The ensemble made “Black Angels” the centerpiece of its concert Friday evening at the University of Colorado at Boulder.
The piece, which carries the subtitle “Thirteen Images from a Dark Land,” opens with jarring, high-pitched screeching and then slowly unfolds into a haunting, perception-bending soundscape.
While the four stringed instruments of a standard quartet anchor this piece, the heavy amplification and unconventional performance methods often make them sound completely foreign.
In addition, Crumb has incorporated shouts and other vocalizations in the piece, as well as a small battery of other instruments, including maracas, gongs and bowed glasses of water.
Indeed, the heart of this piece is arguably an elegiac section in which the cello is joined with the other musicians performing on the water glasses, creating an ethereal sound with gut-wrenching emotional impact.
In one extraordinary piece, Crumb somehow managed to musically encompass the many conflicting faces of Vietnam War, including fear, chaos, confusion, anger, death and sadness.
The Kronos has built an international reputation taking on extreme musical challenges like this one, and it is hard to imagine any other ensemble topping this gripping, technically exacting and superbly choreographed performance.
The first half of the program consisted of the kind of musical kaleidoscope for which the Kronos is well known, with works by composers from Brooklyn to the Balkans.
The four selections were hardly happenstance. Each owes a clear debt to “Black Angels” in the way it stretches the bounds of the string quartet. Alekandra Vrebalov’s “. . . hold me, neighbor, in this storm . . .” for example, incorporates a soundtrack of ambient sounds as well as the gusle and tapan, traditional ethnic Balkan instruments.
Kyle MacMillan: 303-954-1675 or kmacmillan@denverpost.com
