{"id":3574,"date":"2012-01-11T13:19:34","date_gmt":"2012-01-11T17:19:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/?p=3574"},"modified":"2012-02-10T19:38:24","modified_gmt":"2012-02-10T23:38:24","slug":"mann-at-manhattan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/?p=3574","title":{"rendered":"Masterly Mann at Manhattan"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Sedgwick Clark<\/strong><\/p>\n

In their wildest dreams, the six string quartets couldn\u2019t have asked for more. Nor could music lovers, as the Manhattan School of Music rang in the New Year with what it called the \u201cInaugural Robert Mann String Quartet Institute.\u201d Yes, this is why I left Muncie, but this time my hometown friends could share the event, for the Thursday and Friday master classes were streamed worldwide. Those who couldn\u2019t attend could watch the great man inspire several gifted young musicians in works by Brahms, Bart\u00f3k, and Beethoven, among others. And now they can see both classes by going to www.dl.msmnyc.edu\/archive<\/a>. Which I highly recommend!<\/p>\n

For those not into chamber music, Robert Mann is renowned as the founding first violinist of the Juilliard String Quartet (in 1946) and, moreover, probably the postwar era\u2019s foremost influence on the \u201cAmerican\u201d style of chamber-music playing. Since retiring from the Quartet in 1997, he has continued to perform chamber music, conduct, give master classes, and teach on the faculty of the Manhattan School. The passion and personality of the many JSQ performances I\u2019ve heard over the years in concert and on record were fully evident in his comments at Friday\u2019s session. Indeed, his many expressive tips to the PUBLIQuartet in the Poco allegretto<\/em> of Brahms\u2019s Third Quartet gave me an appreciation of the music I\u2019d never had before.<\/p>\n

As usual, however, it was the Bart\u00f3k performances that grabbed me. The Juilliard recorded the six quartets three times since 1950. It was the second cycle\u2014recorded in 1963, released in 1965, and honored with a Grammy the next year\u2014that introduced me to the works and which I still prefer above all others. (The CD reissue, now on Sony Classical\/ArchivMusic 77119, sounds excellent. Mann is on all three cycles; be sure you get the one with Cohen, Hillyer, and Adam.) A complete Juilliard Bart\u00f3k cycle at Alice Tully Hall, 43 years ago this month, is no less vivid in my early New York memory bank than my first Bernstein\/Philharmonic concert, or Colin Davis leading Peter Grimes<\/em> with Jon Vickers and Wozzeck<\/em> with Geraint Evans at the Met. In the mid 1980s, the JSQ\u2019s long-time press rep, Alix Williamson, presented the group in the complete Brahms and Bart\u00f3k quartets at Tully, and I complained that she was devaluing Bart\u00f3k. Alix, who loved Brahms and detested Bart\u00f3k, barked endearingly that if she listened to the likes of me, no one would come. I miss her.<\/p>\n

Mann\u2019s insightful blend of performance comments, anecdotes, and cheerleading at Manhattan\u2014filmed admirably, by the way, with none of the herky-jerky camera cross-cutting that can compromise one’s attention\u2014revealed a master of persuasion. When the Ars Nova Quartet plays the Allegro molto capriccioso<\/em> second movement of Bart\u00f3k\u2019s Second Quartet, Mann initially has nothing but praise, telling of the time a group played the Third Quartet for the composer and was disappointed when Bart\u00f3k simply stood up and said, \u201cGood, let\u2019s have lunch.\u201d Mann continues, \u201cThe great composers are less critical than you might think.\u201d He suggests that the young players should worry less about wrong notes and dig in more. \u201cYou know, Bart\u00f3k as a performer played very cool, but he liked performers to play wildly.\u201d The violist demurs, \u201cBut we\u2019re on the Internet.\u201d Still, the Ars Nova foursome plays part of the movement again, digging in as prescribed, and the results are markedly superior\u2014as in every case of following Mann\u2019s masterly advice.<\/p>\n

Next, the Old City Quartet plays the Mesto-Burletta<\/em> movement of Bart\u00f3k\u2019s Sixth Quartet. Mann asks for more march character (\u201cIt lacks rhythmic swing\u201d) and evokes the opening of Stravinsky\u2019s L\u2019Histoire du soldat <\/em>as a guide. Later he remarks about a precipitous speedup, laughing robustly, \u201cYour accelerando is too fast: You\u2019re very exciting, but it\u2019s too fast.\u201d After a slower runthrough he says, with a huge grin, \u201cTerrific!\u00a0 I\u2019d like you in my quartet,\u201d and the four players break into smiles. A final comment: \u201cCan you make a bigger bite on that C?\u201d he asks the first violinist, and when he does Mann shouts, \u201cAh-h-h-h, wonderful!\u201d<\/p>\n

Now 91, Robert Mann seems the youngest man in the room. I can\u2019t wait for next year\u2019s master classes.<\/p>\n

Looking Forward<\/strong><\/p>\n

Concerts I would attend next week were I not on vacation:<\/p>\n

1\/14 Galapagos Art Space, 16 Main Street, DUMBO, Brooklyn. 4:30-9:00 p.m. Brooklyn Art Song Society. Complete Songs of Charles Ives (114).<\/p>\n

1\/18-21 Avery Fisher Hall. New York Philharmonic\/Alan Gilbert; Lang Lang, piano. Lindberg: Feria<\/em>. Bart\u00f3k: Piano Concerto No. 2. Prokofiev: Symphony No. 5.<\/p>\n

1\/20 Carnegie Hall. American Symphony Orchestra\/Leon Botstein. Stravinsky: The King of the Stars<\/em>; Mavra<\/em>; Requiem Canticles<\/em>; Canticum Sacrum<\/em>; Babel<\/em>; Symphony of Psalms<\/em>.<\/p>\n