There was a full house for the Eroica String Quartet's Halifax Philharmonic Club concert dedicated to the memory of Patricia Perks and featuring Halifax violinists Peter and Julia Hanson with Vicci Wardman, viola, and cellist David Watkin.
With th
eir unpretentious, unhistrionic style, they applied their acute musical intelligence to a technically demanding programme.
Beethoven's singularly unmelodic Quartet in F Minor, Op 95, aptly dubbed Serioso, sounded very modern, almost experimental. After a rather untidy first movement the contemplative fugual allegretto was thoughtfully explored, while the arbitary changes of rhythm and mood in the final movement were deftly handled.
Mendelssohn's debt to Beethoven's influence is evident in his Quartet No 6 in F Minor, Op 80, written in 1847 after the sudden death of his adored sister Fanny and just before his own death through over-work aged 38.
Expressive playing enabled the demonic energy of the outer movements to expose the bleak nostalgia lying at the heart of this tortured work.
The warm Russian lyricism of Borodin's Quartet No 2 in D, written in 1880, was a welcome respite from all this angst. The Eroica Quartet let themselves go at last, savouring its lush, melodic, slightly exotic vibe to the full.
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