Stanford LIVE presents 25th Anniversary Concert featuring St. Lawrence String Quartet with special guest, David Finckel
2014-10-19
Bing Concert Hall
Stanford University, 327 Lasuen St, Stanford, CA
2:30 PM, Sunday, October 19, 2014

Back to the previous event! ☸ Up to the 2014 yearbox! ☸ Up to the 2014 event list! ☸ On to the next event!

• Haydn: String Quartet in D Minor, Op. 9, No. 4
• Jonathan Berger: new work TBA
• Schubert: String Quintet in C Major, D. 956, op. 163, featuring David Finckel

[2:31 PM, lights down, announcements from Steve Sano & Wiley Hausam to commemorate 25 years from the SLSQ]

Joseph Haydn (1732-1809): String Quartet No. 11 in D Minor, Op. 9, No. 4, H. III:22 (ca. 1768-1770) (ca. 20 min)

1. [2:35 PM] Allegro moderato
2. [2:42? PM] Menuet – Trio
3. [2:47 PM] Adagio cantabile
4. [2:52 PM] Finale: Presto
   [work ends 2:56 PM; pause while the band heads off, then returns with Jonathan Berger in tow]

[2:58 PM comments from Geoff Nuttall and Jonathan Berger]

Jonathan Berger (b.1954): String Quartet No. 6, Swallow (world premiere)

1. [3:02 PM] Poco volgare ma semplice
2. [3:05 PM] Beckoning, desolate, fragile
3. [3:10 PM] Vivace
4. [3:14 PM] Lento
5. [3:19 PM] Agitato
   [set ends 3:25 PM]

[3:48 PM lights down, thanks and comments from Geoff Nuttall]

Franz Schubert (1797-1828): String Quintet in C Major, D. 956, op. 163, (1828) AKA Cello Quintet
featuring David Finckel

1. [3:53 PM] Allegro ma non troppo
2. [4:07 PM] Adagio
3. [4:25 PM] Scherzo
4. [4:31 PM] Allegretto
   [set ends 4:41 PM; bows and thanks, off at 4:42 PM, no encore]

St. Lawrence String Quartet

• Christopher Costanza: cello;
• Geoff Nuttall: violin;
• Scott St. John: violin;
• Lesley Robertson: viola.

• David Finckel: cello.

I fight Sunday traffic to get to Refuge in Menlo park and meet TC for a pre show beer and snack. Love the list here, even if it tends towards the higher alcohol beers. Case in point, my first choice, the Twisted Manzanita Chaotic, a 10% double IPA. Strong, but very smooth. Yum!

TC arrives after a bit and we decide to share a bowl of nachos. They're tasty, but not particularly noteworthy. Second beer for me today is a Grimmbergen Dubbel. It's certainly good, but like the nachos, not particularly distinctive right now. Had the Chaotic been less potent, I'd have gone for another, but it seemed prudent to choose something mellower instead, after all, there's the matter of the short drive over to Stanford yet to be attempted! All goes well with that trip, and with a transition not worth noting any further, I soon find myself inside Bing and in my seat at exactly the right time. Yay!

We're seated in the last row of the middle tier today – a little farther back than I'd pick if I was allowed, but well-centered counts for something, and the sound of the unamplified quartet here is excellent. In fact, my only complaint with respect to the sound is that the hall is so resonant that each cough or dropped program – even from the far side of the room – is an alarmingly loud distraction. Oh well. Time to practice focusing my attention on the action onstage instead!

The performance, as you might guess, is truly excellent. It's not for nothing that these folks have stayed together for 25 years, and the commitment and drive that keeps them together is evidenced in the sparkling virtuosity that they apply to each piece on the program. As commented by Jonathan Berger in his remarks, being sandwiched between Haydn and Schubert is simultaneously a tall compliment and a ridiculously tough place to fit in. No doubt he tried hard to come up with something fitting, but his new work failed to capture my imagination. I recognized a bit of the initial bowing and scraping as evocative of bird calls, but those sounds didn't seem to coalesce into any sort of melody for me to follow, so my attention soon waned. I suppose I might like the work better upon a second listen, but unless the SLSQ puts it out commercially, I don't expect to get that chance any time soon.

Break afforded a chance to head outside and enjoy the fine afternoon air, and to unwind a little from being cooped up inside. Given the weather today, I'd prefer an outdoor show, but that wasn't in the offering, so we head inside as they ring the chimes to announce the end of intermission.

I'ed been looking forward to attending this performance of the Schubert cello quintet ever since I spotted it on the Stanford Live calendar last spring. Quintets don't come up in the performance repertoire all that often, due in part, no doubt, to the difficulty of finding suitable fifth players to integrate with the established string quartets. And as the fifth part in a quintet varies among the three standard instruments (not to mention piano, clarinet and other choices), that last part is necessarily going to bobble around – there's not too many world-class violists who double on violin and/or cello!

Anyways, the set started off with a brief speech from GN about how the SLSQ decided that the perfect way to celebrate their 25th Anniversary would be to invite DF – who'd served as mentor to the group when they were getting started – to play the Schubert cello quintet with them. Yay! Good thinking!

The opening movements unfold delicately and mellifluously over the next half hour. Normally that span of time would be enough to encompass an entire opus, but here it serves only to set up the amazing scherzo that Schubert constructed as the third movement. With its immediately recognizable 'bugle call' hunting theme as a recurring riff, this is one of my favorite bits in the chamber repertoire, and the SLSQ+1 served it well, bouncing jauntily through their parts with grace and elan – the most elegant country romp ever written! The concluding allegretto was ever so fine, and then, all too soon (not even 50 minutes gone!), the work was over.

I'd expected an encore, or perhaps a champagne and cake reception, to top off this 25th Anniversary celebration, but instead, we got the usual waves and bows. Hmmn. The champagne must have been saved for a special big donor event instead. Nonetheless, I'm quite happy with having attended this show, looking forward to seeing them in Berkeley towards the end of next month, and sad that I won't be able to fit in any of the other SLSQ gigs at Stanford from this season. Maybe next year!

Back to the previous event! ☸ Up to the 2014 yearbox! ☸ Up to the 2014 event list! ☸ On to the next event!