Music and Dance Reviews : Cavani String Quartet Makes Local Debut

Despite an impressive string of fellowships, awards and competition victories accumulated in its six-year career, the Cavani String Quartet left a fuzzy impression at its local debut, presented by the Music Guild, Wednesday in the Wilshire Ebell Theatre.

The Cavanis--violinists Annie Fullard and Susan Waterbury, violist Erika Eckert, cellist Merry Peckham--are players of high accomplishment as individuals but their ensemble seems in need of tightening.

In portions of quartets by Mozart (K. 387), Bartok (No. 2) and Brahms (Opus 51, No. 2), the Cavani--in residence at the Cleveland Institute of Music and named after a 19th-Century Italian violin maker--produced a warm, middleweight tone of considerable refinement.

But their Mozart, served as warm-up fodder, was for the most part untidy and overbalanced by the violins. The mystery and anguish of Bartok’s Second Quartet emerged only intermittently in these players’ hands, the opening Moderato being somewhat of a scramble and the ferocious ensuing movement dissipating its energies (and clarity of line) after a promisingly powerful opening statement.

Bartok’s crushingly sad finale brought forth the evening’s most polished, balanced work, with the four players functioning as a smooth-toned, expressive unit.

No attempt was, however, made at harnessing the sprawl of Brahms’ A-minor Quartet. Each movement was forcefully, clearly announced, but only in the Minuet-like third movement were both rhythmic drive and linear clarity maintained.

The performers have had sufficient major exposure to rule out debut nerves as reason for their haphazard presentations on this occasion. But one wonders whether they have ever been exposed to an audience so generously populated with marathon coughers and unrestrained throat-clearers as Wednesday’s crowd. It could have unhinged the toughest old pros.