Wigmore Hall
Beethoven – String Quartet no.2
1 in G major, op.18 no.2
Bartók – String Quartet no.6
Bartók’s string quartets are
surely as close to the equivalents for the twentieth century of Beethoven’s quartets
to the nineteenth as any works for the medium not by Beethoven could be. I
should be tempted to add ‘Discuss’; however, in the midst of exam season, the
last thing I want is any more essays to mark. Let us take that, then, as read,
and say that nothing could be more apt for the Jerusalem Quartet’s celebration
of its twentieth anniversary than a series in which it combines works by
Beethoven and Bartók.
In this BBC Lunchtime Concert
at the Wigmore Hall, Beethoven’s G major Quartet, op.18 no.2, came first. The
first movement opened with a typically cultivated sound and, just as important,
a true sense of life in the music. This was recognisably post-Mozart,
post-Haydn, but with some emphasis on the ‘post-’ too, not least in the accents
and insistency of Kyril Zlotnikov’s cello part, soon echoed elsewhere, for instance
by Alexander Pavolovsky’s first violin, towards the end of the exposition. The
exposition repeat was taken, the music heard for the second time fulfilling the
twin functions of recollection and progression, the development section thus
taking development further still. So did the recapitulation. My only real
quibble was the (relative) withdrawal of vibrato for some of the fugal writing,
which did not sound as though it were done entirely out of conviction. I loved,
however, the (almost) throwaway ending.
The long lines and
post-Mozartian luxuriance of the Adagio
cantabile sections of the second movement were as striking as their decidedly
‘late’ or ‘late-ish’ Allegro
counterparts: not so fragile or disjunct, perhaps, but played – and heard – in the
knowledge that such would, in Beethoven’s œuvre, soon become a necessity, the
generative quality of the composer’s rhythms notwithstanding. The return of the
Adagio cantabile music sounded still more Elysian, yet there was sadness
to the close too. Lilting joy and nagging insistence characterised the scherzo:
here there were to be experienced both balance and dialectical interplay. The
trio was finely poised, rightly, in similar yet contrasting fashion. Haydn’s
spirit was present, indeed inescapable, in the opening statement of the finale –
and why would anyone wish to escape it? Yet there was soon also a
boisterousness to be heard that was not really his. Such were the terms of the
human comedy that unfolded.
The first movement of Bartók’s
final quartet opened with Ori Kam’s viola, not only mesto as marked but
splendidly misterioso, finding its
way, asking (lamenting?): how did we (humanity?) come to this and yet, also,
where must we go? I thought a little of the opening of Mahler’s Tenth Symphony.
There was barely suppressed fury in the ensuing Vivace material, like one of the insufficient instrumental answers
prior to the entry of the word in the finale to Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.
Except, of course there would be no words: tragedy or another path?
Uncertainty, here and elsewhere, seemed very much to be the game (which is not
to say that these were ‘uncertain’ performances, quite the contrary.) The
intensity of this first movement, and not only this movement, seemed to be part
of a despairing attempt to turn inwards in the face of the horrors surrounding.
In context, it seems anything but a cheap point to remind us that Bartók wrote
the work in 1939, his last prior to leaving Europe.
The return to the mesto material at the beginning of the
second movement was more clearly a cry, and yet the terms of that cry remained
enigmatic. Cries became stronger still, more passionate, in the Marcia, without ever shaking off the
shadow of sadness. Likewise in the third movement, although in both the mesto and the Burletta music, there was perhaps a greater note of bitterness, or
was it resignation? The ambiguity was fruitful. What to make of the
Stravinskian echoes? That question, not answering it, was surely the point. A Soldier seemed to wish to tell a new Tale; that did not mean that we could,
or should, understand it. There was a sense of arrival, of inevitability, and
yet also of uncertainty to the final Mesto
movement: as finely balanced as the demands of Beethoven. In an atmosphere of serenity
that disquieted, here was a destination that seemed at best to be a land of
exile. And so it went on, until it did not. Almost the only thing not in doubt
was the sincerity of work and performance alike. The rest would be silence.
