Aussie, French, Czech

Someone couldn't use a ticket so I got to a Selby concert.  It was Selby on piano with her selection for this concert, a piano quartet, violin, viola, cello.  And it was a quite a worthy set of players and instruments, not least SSO and Brodsky Quartet amongst many others.  The mention of instrument makers had me listening for preferences.  I particularly liked the Guadagnini violin and found the Amati viola somewhat nondescript, but there are so many factors.  Not least Llewellyn Hall which always seems cavernous and particularly so for this lineup.  They played Stanhope, Faure and Dvorak in that order and that's the order of my preferences.  From talking with other audience, I got the feeling Dvorak was the fave and Stanhope the unwelcome.  Certainly he was different, all odd counts and more modern harmonies.  I found myself trying to count while phrases seemed to fall as 5 then 5 then 4 then whatever, but probably sitting within 4/4 bars.  I was not sure but intrigued.  The Faure was also soft but, given the informed introductions to each piece, had me thinking French vs German and I could feel the difference and that intrigued me.  Then Dvorak, with pretty simple underlying chord structures and mostly predictable parts over.  There were some spots I warmed to (mvt.4?) but mostly it just seemed obvious stuff.  This music has gone on for a few centuries and can become ordinary without the churn of change to disrupt and enliven it.  But just my uninformed musicological thoughts.  The works were Paul Stanhope My song in love unknown (2000), Faure Piano quartet no.1 Cmin, Dvorak Piano quartet no,2 Ebmaj.  Comfy keys...

Kathryn Selby (piano) convened Andrew Haverson (violin), Tobias Breider (viola) and Miles Mullin-Chivers (cello) at Llewellyn to play Stanhope, Faure and Dvorak.

Finally

Finally Selby. I've heard about these concerts but never attended. Kathryn Selby is a Sydney pianist. She regularly gathers some mates, top players in Sydney, to perform at the NGA (and Angel Place in Sydney). It's chamber music, ranging over time. This time her friends were Sophie Rowell, Tobias Breider, Julian Smiles and "development artist" Anna Da Silva Chen. The music was great, but so was the performance. Absolutely convincing. They started with Ross Edwards Piano trio (piano, violin, cello), then Fauré Piano Quartet no.1 C minor Op.15 (added viola), then Schumann Piano quintet Eb major Op.44. The titles were none too flash. I was chatting with others after about favourites, but I couldn't pick one. They were all hugely different in style, but impressive and demands and also in interest. My ears pricked up for the spacious piano and melodic cello and the explosive third movement in Edwards. But the canon and the pizz with gambolling piano in Faure appealled. And the attractiveness of the whole and fiery running scales in the fourth movement of Schumann. These guys had serious chops. Julian Smiles played with tablet and foot page switch, but he seemed to have a terrific memory: he didn't seem to look at it too often. The others had paper and Kathyrn had her page turner. All standard. And it was nice to see a young player being brought into the fold. She was very good but the difference is apparent in an A-B comparison like this. But this was seriously satisfying chamber music. Good reason for the following it clearly has.

Kathryn Selby (piano, leader) performed with Sophie Rowell (violin), Tobias Breider (viola), Julian Smiles (cello) and Anna Da Silva Chen (violin) at the NGA theatre.