The Hargen
Quartet
Bach The
Art of Fugue – Contrapunta I - IV
Bartok String
Quartet no. 4
Beethoven String
Quartet no. 8 in E minor
It was very meaningful to go to a Quartet
recital right after my own quartet rehearsal.
The Hargen Quartet has the cleanest playing
that I’ve ever heard. It is a very brave attempt to begin the recital with such
a piece that is so complex in texture, yet harmonic content, and hence
intonation concern, is so important. Intonation is well controlled. Every chord
is well tuned, and the intertwined phrases are manipulated in a macro senses
that the whole texture is growing in the ears of audiences, yet each individual
voices is equally audible while well layered into different colour according to
their importance of the time. Imitative entries are so exact. Articulations are
well framed in good rhythms. Most impressive is they tuned every last chord of
the movements really with perfect intonation, perfect shape and ends perfectly
together.
I’ve heard the 5th movement of the
Bartok piece from CD once. This time is happily not a disappointment at all.
The group shows extreme contrasts in colours, articulations, and especially
dynamics. Strings quartets are often fall into the trap of limitations of
variety of sounds (but many can have a varied sets of intonations~!) and the
Hargen Quartet is one of those few which can escape from the trap. Though to
the audience who sit near to the stage may have hard times to experience one of
the poor thing of strings players – percussive noise which often results when
the players attempt the loudest limit of such small and thin instruments (In
more ‘classical’ or ‘romantic’ music such loudness may not be required, while
in music approaching the 20th century composers exploring new sounds
for new stimulation and sensation. May be the architecture of concert hall
doesn’t catch near enough to let everyone enjoy the beauty of the 20th
century music – or does it the original intention of the composer to let us
hear the noise of his/ her anger? Haha…), I luckly can sit a little further and
hence enjoy the aggregate energy and excitement created by the attempt.
The interpretation of the Beethoven is, to me,
very authentic. Exactness, which is the central spirit of Beethoven’s music, is
well maintained. May be it is relatively the easiest piece to be understand
musically, the unity of sound among players is a little bit off as the cello
player seems too expressive then the others. Technique is also one of the
elements that block the group being together and sadly there are very obvious
mistakes in the last movements. But it should be mentioned that this is really
a hard piece in the string quartet repertoire and the Hargen Quartet really did
a much admirable job.
After the concert, much impressed, I chatted a
little bit with my ex-colleges. I really feel very excited about the concert,
while I couldn’t get as much echoes of wonders as I expected. Are we Chinese
people too shy to express our admiration? Or, on the other way round, we don’t
know how ‘good’ other is? Or, to the most fundamental, we don’t ‘really know’
how ‘hard’ it is to play a quartet? I wonder…