Shostakovich
Cycle V: Emerson String Quartet, QEH, 11.3. 2006 (CC)
The
last three quartets of Shostakovich played in a single
concert is perhaps a daunting concept – not that it
kept away any of the near-capacity audience. Like Beethoven's
late works in this medium, there is a real concentration
of expression, plus evidence of great struggle. Beethoven
though, whatever the struggle, accepts the possibility
of light at the end of the tunnel, a concept unthinkable
for Shostakovich. As if to emphasise this, the Emersons
performed the these quartets in near-darkness, a slightly
muted spotlight on the quartet and (for the Fifteenth
at least) only the Fire Exit signs on.
The Thirteenth Quartet, Op.
138 of 1970 effectively features the viola. It was written
for Vadim Borisovsky, who had left the famous Beethoven
Quartet in 1964. It provided ample opportunity for the
Emerson's Lawrence Dutton to shine, and shine he did,
his long unaccompanied lines deep-toned and melancholy.
Ghostly non-vibrato chords from his colleagues, a cello
parody of a walking bass, and astringent attacks meant
that this interpretation staunchly avoided any hint
of a comfort zone. If Setzer's First Violin was a trifle
over-literal on occasion, perhaps it is best to err
in this direction for works such as this. It was eminently
believable that this work post-dates the astonishing
Fourteenth symphony by a year.
The Fourteenth Quartet, Op.
142 (1973) includes some late-Shostakovich cheerfulness
(read cheerfulness in full shadow) plus cello writing
which, in David Finckel's capable hands, hearkened back
to the First Cello Concerto. There was lots of energy
here - the way the two-note theme was almost literally
thrown around the four instruments in the finale, for
example. Shifting, restless and even invoking Ives in
one chordal passage, this is a fascinating work whose
bitter-sweet close appears at the time surprising, yet
the only way to finish.
The second half brought a reminder
that the Fifteenth Quartet is, to my mind at least,
Shostakovich's supreme masterpiece. A reminder too,
of the Borodin Quartet's performance at the Barbican
(late eighties/early nineties?) that reduced its audience
to numbed, and extended, silence. Not quite the same
level of concentration here, yet much to admire nevertheless.
The emaciated second violin at the opening (Drucker)
was as blanched a sound as can be imagined; straight
octaves between viola and cello were quite simply Death
captured in sound-waves. The bleak landscape of this
amazing score (five Adagios and an Adagio molto) is
such a challenge to any interpreters; the nerve required
to give the single-note crescendi impact is remarkable
and most disturbing they were, too. Setzer, whom I have
sometimes considered inferior to Drucker despite their
supposed interchangeability, really came into his own
as he proved himself capable of projecting huge emotions.
A Funeral March in the midst of all this is almost (pardon
the expression) the final nail in the coffin, and indeed
the Emersons came close to plumbing these six-foot depths.
From the concerts I heard in
this series, the Emersons remain a formidable ensemble;
if not a great one.
Colin Clarke
