Heath Quartet

Fairly full house in one of the smaller halls at Dorking for the first of this year's three string quartet concerts, given this year by the Heath Quartet (reference 1), heard once by us once before, for Haydn and Beethoven at a Wigmore lunchtime, and on which occasion they served us well (reference 2). Larger hall taken by a collectibles fair.

Before the break we had Mozart's K.421 and Beethoven's Op.135, both truly fine pieces but neither was quite right on this occasion, with some sort of drifting in the second halves of both of them. Probably me having had too much lunch beforehand.

While the Tchaikovsky Op.11 after the break was pleasant, but rather anodyne by comparison, despite the energetic puff given for the second movement, the Andante Cantabile. While the cello, who seemed to have a fair amount of open string work, seemed to be quite the reverse of energetic, rather laid back. Bored even.

But the good news was that, at long last, they seemed to have managed to organise refreshments for the performers in the interval, and they did not have to come looking, as has been the case in the past.

PS: I have now tried one of the YouTube versions - the Borodin Quartet one at reference 3 - and while the 'pleasant' above seems a bit harsh, I can't come up with a better word. Perhaps it would do better after a gentle evening meal, taken with a little red, rather than in the full glare of a Sunday afternoon.

Reference 1: http://www.heathquartet.com/.

Reference 2: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/op131.html.

Reference 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZFUaQxuymA.