Cuarteto Casals

To the Wigmore Hall last week to hear, for the first time, there being no record of them either here or at the other place (http://pumpkinstrokemarrow.blogspot.co.uk/), the Cuarteto Casals (see reference 1). Furthermore the violinist who played first for the first and last pieces (First A) reminded me of a former fireman from TB and I think I would have remembered him had I seen him before.

Haydn Op.33 No.3, aka 'The Bird'. Mozart K465, aka 'Dissonance'. Schubert D804, aka 'Rosamunde'.

Another first was baking bread on the same day as a concert, so I had my first taste of the new bread in a picnic taken on the chairs outside the café at the back of BHS.

Into the hall to be greeted by one small music stand, two large music stands and one regular music stand. I eventually worked out that the small music stand was actually an Apple with the score on it and discretely worked with a foot pedal. Only the second time I have seen such a thing, It was intended for the use of the First A and First B was a little taken aback when it fell to her lot for the encore - but she managed. Only the second time that I have seen such a thing - with it being rather irritating that I cannot now track down the first, a pianist who stood his notebook up on the surface behind the keyboard. The best I can do is reference 2. In any event, as far as I could see First A did not make much use of it, playing more or less from memory.

The dress of the three male performers was mainly smart casual, but all dark and all different. Only one suit. The lady violinist, First B, had an off the shoulder dress which looked very smart, but presumably had the downside that she had to worry about the appearance of all the flesh so exposed. And the upside that it left the arms and shoulders free. I was reminded of Rosen's remark in his (very good) book about piano playing ('Piano Notes') that shorts and tee-shirt would be most comfortable for the rather physical business of playing the piano at a concert. He may have gone on to say that the classical music audience would probably not like that, so he settled for something conservative, but without tails and bow tie. More of him in due course.

There seemed to be at least three kinds of bow in action, one for First A, one for the cello and another for the other two, with that for First A seeming to have a larger gap than usual between the hair and the wood. Bows which the programme told us were a matching set of period bows bought with an award from the Borletti-Buitoni trust. See reference 3 for a previous encounter with this trust.

I liked the stage manners of this quartet and I liked their sound, which was particularly striking for the Haydn and the Mozart. They even offered a few of those moments of musical transcendence, during which, for a short while, the rest of the world fades away. And respect for the country of venue in the form of an encore from Purcell, I think Fantasia No.4.

All in all an excellent concert and we shall watch out for further opportunities to hear this Cuarteto.

Out to be soundly beaten up the stairs at Vauxhall by three young men who managed to run all the way up.

PS 1: google now tells me that Fantasia No.4 was written for 4 viols and the YouTube version does not sound familiar at all. Maybe I got the name wrong - but I liked whatever it was well enough at the time.

PS 2: worried away at the Apple and eventually tracked it down to Dorking, earlier this year, at reference 4. The winning search term was 'electronic piano', having tried various permutations of apple, score, page, piano, wigmore, qeh, korean, japanese and chinese.

Reference 1: http://cuartetocasals.com/.

Reference 2: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/things-swedish.html.

Reference 3: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/borletti-buitoni-trust.html.

Reference 4: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/dorking-time-again.html.