ALINEA STRING QUARTET AT ROBINSON COLLEGE CHAPEL
The Alinea String Quartet like to do things differently. No they don’t rehearse on a disused railway track but they are going places. One of them is Robinson College Chapel where the acoustic is heavenly . Underrated as a venue, this modernist grandeur sums up the contradictions of the music. Classical but adventurous, we heard Schulhoff, Brahms and Jeremy Thurlow’s accomplished works swell around the space .
On their way Up, the Alinea String Quartet delighted Robinson Chapel
But on the coldest night of the year, Robinson College Chapel was surely the chilliest spot in East Anglia.: any musicians would have their work cut out to entertain an audience, even muffled in winter coats and even scarves . Notwithstanding, the players performed with dynamism, their skill never less than near- perfect
Young vibrant and dedicated, the Alinea Quartet have already attracted prizes in Europe and are surely destined for further fame. They began with Five pieces for String Quartet by the sadly forgotten Erwin Schuhoff,:it took us through a brilliant sequence a Viennese Waltz-style piece with jazz overtones, an amazing Serenade crowded with dark lugubrious sonority , then a vivacious Czech For dance and finally a Tango and a frenetic Tarantella. Seldom performed in his lifetime - which ended as a dissident in a Nazi prison, these are works we shall surely hear again. Violinists Fanny Anais Schnell and Mario Sögtrop made magic out of this material – whilst David Fuchs’ soulful cello and viola maestro Justus Schümmer deepened the mood from vivacious Hungarian pizzicatos to the elements of dissonance which mark this music out as part of its time, 1924 . Or even – before its time – it has some surreal elements which presage John Cage.
Composer Jeremy Thurlow] explained his String Quartet Number 1 The quartet had worked hard on this complex piece, Jeremy described as ‘very difficult’ and thanked them for their persistence. Yet when the music began it emerged as the zenith of lyrical simplicity, a sleight of hand only a consummate composer could engineer. The three movements Spacious, Swift and Stark were a mellifluous sequence, as one member of the audience confessed ‘I closed my eyes and went on a wonderful journey.’ It was also intricate and modernist – the first movement reflects a contemplation I associate with the return of lovely weather, the bold electricity of the second movement, with the stress of urban pressures. The third, Stark, is a resolution of the two moods and ends the piece with a calm realism, a satisfying restfulness. The piece so struck me as a musical reflection of the tri-partite University term , with its hopeful beginning, tempestuous revision and final resolutions , a re-title of this composition could be ‘Cambridge Spring’.
A bleak interval followed where – er- nothing was on offer for us concertgoers. My next-door neighbour fantasized about ‘mulled wine’.
The Brahms String Quartet as the second half, was a brilliant performance from the Alinea in dazzling energetic form. Brahms was, Jeremy Thurlow told us, a huge perfectionist. The colour and delight conjured by the players must have warmed them up. Sadly for the audience temperatures by this time had reached Arctic levels. “ I bet Brahms had a roaring fire going when he played it ‘ moaned one young person miserably in a William Brown-style complaint.
We ended however, with the warm well- deserved smiles of our talented entertainers.
Art conquers All.
