Melburnians were treated to a marathon three hours of avant-garde chamber music, when New York’s JACK Quartet gave two concerts in one evening at the Melbourne Recital Centre on their first Australian tour.
The Quartet specialises in twentieth and twenty-first century string quartet music and its first concert featured the Australian premiere of “String Creatures” by Sydney-based composer Liza Lim, alongside two twentieth century American quartets.
After a short interval, during which Marshall McGuire presented a post-concert chat with Liza Lim, the JACK Quartet returned to the stage for a second concert, “Up late”, showcasing six short works by contemporary American composers, including two JACK Quartet members.
With accent lighting casting shadows over the furrows in the wood panelling around the Elisabeth Murdoch stage, the scene was set.
7PM: STRING CREATURES
Ruth Crawford Seeger is known particularly for her contribution to American folk music, but there was nothing folksy about this atonal piece.
It was clear from the opening phrase of Ruth Crawford Seeger’s String Quartet 1931 that close listening would be needed. A piercingly high, sweet melody from the first violin and a bumpy and quite unmelodic reply from the cello initiated a complex musical conversation. Crawford Seeger’s music had its own impetus and contrasts, which the players highlighted with gestures and extremely tight ensemble playing.
Elliot Carter’s String Quartet No 1 was written during a spell in the desert during 1950-51. The program notes helpfully explain that Carter was influenced by the continuously changing desert landscape and Cocteau’s film, The Blood of a Poet, where “dream-like action is framed by an interrupted, slow-motion shot of a brick chimney in an empty lot being detonated”.
A note on Carter’s website explains he was attempting to explore the difference between external time and dream time (which feels longer than it actually lasts). The cello’s opening cadenza captured the moment of detonation, while dream-like sequences were realised in a succession of overlapping musical conversations between the four parts. As in a verbal conversation, the musicians were constantly interrupting each other, embellishing, and digressing from the themes they introduced. As in a dream, there were many sudden shifts in mood and tempo, which the players brought out with gestures and impeccable ensemble playing.
Sydney-based composer Liza Lim was present for this performance of String Creatures. She confessed in a post-concert chat with Marshall McGuire that, trained as a violinist, she has had a lifelong fascination with string and string instruments.
She said writing for strings was a tactile experience. In String Creatures (with movements called Cat’s Cradle, Untethered and A nest woven from the inside out) she explored different ways of exciting the strings, such as the first violin “chopping” at the string, bluegrass style at the beginning, and a quartertone cello solo in the final movement. The music shimmered, with what Marshall McGuire described as “a haze of harmonics” floating in the still air, with the players’ bows (choreographed) sweeping the strings above the fingerboard, and their inhalations and exhalations (also scripted) faintly audible.
Lim’s work, and the Quartet’s performance rightly received a standing ovation.
9.30PM: UP LATE
Those who stayed up late found themselves seated on the Elisabeth Murdoch stage, just metres from the players, creating a more intimate setting for the six short works on this program.
Cellist Jay Campbell explained that all six pieces were from the Quartet’s “Modern Medieval” repertoire, and the twenty-first century works this program are all to some extent rooted in medieval music with its “weird microtonalities and hyper-complex rhythms”.
The Quartet commissioned Juri Seo, a Korean American composer, to write Three Imaginary Chansons for the Modern Medieval program. The Quartet brought out the strong rhythms and lively themes in this work with verve and energy.
In Songs from the Seventh Floor, Johnny Macmillan conjured up an ethereal, rather spooky scene using a fascinating array of string techniques. There were hollow tones that seemed to slide (glissandos on harmonics) and wobble weirdly (an unusual type of trill), and exquisitely sustained notes that seemed to come out of nowhere. For the audience, the most surprising effect was probably the moment when the cellist started playing with two bows simultaneously, the thick rich chords adding depth to the frenzied playing of the upper strings in the climax.
Christopher Otto introduced his own work, Miserere, saying it was inspired by the work of sixteenth century English organist and composer Nathanial Giles, who experimented extensively with complex rhythms.
The next work on the program, Caleb Burhans’ Contritus, could be described as a modern chorale. Burhans looped short but mellow harmonic phrases, a rhythmical pizzicato motif, and bell-like harmonics.
Dave’s Hocket is a new work by Quartet violinist Austin Wulliman, and this was the first performance. Wulliman said he wanted to convey a state of ecstasy, such as that felt by the young monk in Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose. Musically, the piece revolves around a hocket (two parts sharing a single melody). This one, Wulliman said, refers back to “Hoquetus David” by medieval French composer Guillaume de Machaut, “mashed up” with Arvo Pärt’s “Fratres”. Wulliman’s version involved constant interplay between the parts, but they were so fully and effectively interwoven that the complex musical lines seemed to have come from a single source. Wulliman himself seemed pleased with the performance.
The program ended with Gabriella Smith’s Carrot Revolution. Smith writes on her website that this quartet was meant as a celebration of fresh ways to look at old things. The “old thing” here is the string quartet (a 250-year-old musical genre); while “carrot revolution” captures the notion that “the day will come when a single, freshly observed carrot will start a revolution”. Smith’s Carrot Revolution was a vibrant, hugely energetic piece, ensuring a (literally) upbeat end to the concert.
Notable throughout the evening was the flair and conviction with which the Quartet brought all these musically and technically challenging works to life. The players were able to infuse these works with their own musical spirit, truly making the works their own and keeping the audience enthralled throughout. The Quartet is on a self-avowed mission “to create an international community through transformative, mind-broadening experiences and close listening”. Judging by the standing ovations it received at both concerts, JACK Quartet can now count Melbourne in.
Photo supplied.
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Sue Kaufmann reviewed JACK Quartet’s performances of “String Creatures” and “Up Late” at the Melbourne Recital Centre on April 10, 2024.
