Concert review: Heath Quartet

Wigmore Hall was only half full for this varied programme, and in one sense the performance was a game of two halves too. Haydn’s String Quartet in B flat major op.50 no.1 drew some close-knit ensemble-playing – with natural interplay in the first movement and co-ordinated, characterful rubato in the playful third-movement Minuet – but overall it lacked the final sheen of seamless tonal blending.

Dutch pianist and composer Henriëtte Bosmans’s 1927 String Quartet was an intriguing inclusion, bearing clear influences of both Debussy and Ravel’s quartets. The Heath Quartet captured the austerity and enigma of the first movement, though the second could have been altogether warmer. The finale was vivid with drive and clarity.

Perhaps it was partly down to the repertoire but to my ears the group played with more intensity and passion after the two violinists swapped (Juliette Roos taking over from Sara Wolstenholme) following the interval. Two of Lyadov’s pieces, a Sarabande and Fugue, for the St Petersburg soirées of publisher Mitrofan Belyayev, were rapt, fragile and denuded of vibrato. The first movement of Korngold’s Third String Quartet wanted for nothing in terms of energy and bite, nor did the second movement in terms of precision. Extrovert as the finale was, the highlight was the stirring, beautifully sustained folk-like third movement.

EDWARD BHESANIA