The Week's Music...

New Zealand Listener, Volume 36, Issue 919, 22 March 1957, Page 15

The Week's Music...

by

SEBASTIAN

rs T was with a sense of foreboding rather than any joyful anticipation that I tuned in to hear the winning ‘entries of the 1956 String Quartet Competition of Liege (YC links). As it turned out, many of my fears were groundless, mainly from the performance point of view: because the Liége Municipal Quartet had obviously studied the entries thoroughly, and their playing even of unpromising passages carried conviction. At times I had the feeling that this was a waste of good artistry: but then-thank goodness-I did not have to judge the entrants. Those who did have to distinguish the merits of such utterly dissimilar pieces deserve our condolences. They were all for quartet-and there the resemblances end, though all exploited the resources of the medium in a determined manner. The winning work, a German one by Kelkel, divided its energies between busy bustling passages and long-drawn sweeps of what sounded like lamentation, with a comparatively human interlude for slow movement: and even the attraction of this may have been due as much to the ennobling effect of the strings as anything. Just as aggressively modernistic (I believe the word is "graunching") was the entry of France's Borsari, whose rather more sentient

i movements were clothed in raiment of needless work, obscuring the outlines with much detail. Otherwise, I found this much more rewarding listening-on a basis of one hearing, that is. Unfortunately, I don’t suppose we shall hear any of these quartets again, or not for a long time. The most pleasing of these works (to me, that is) was an example of that bitter-sweet style in which the British modern deals so successfully, in this case one Wilfred Josephs. In fact, a good deal of it appealed even at first hearing, which is unusual for modern quartets. Possibly this was because I am more familiar with the idiom; but in addition, the composer used a lighter mood, sometimes almost jaunty. This made the plunge back into the Weltschmerz of a Dutch work even more depressing than it should have been. This would be one of my main criticisms of these quartets: like so many modern pieces, they are so in earnest that they have no time for mirth; and very often, to be always earnest is to be painfully dull, so the composers are putting themselves at an initial disadvantage. Still, in this cosmopolitan group-and where are the national distinctions now?-there is much that is music: and for us, that will suffice.