O.C. MUSIC REVIEW : String Octet Proves Uncommonly Efficient

The repertory for string octet is small--very small--so it hardly would have been fair to expect an afternoon of octet masterpieces at Segerstrom Hall when the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields Octet performed Sunday.

With composers such as Gade, Raff, Svendsen and Spohr among the notable contributors to the literature for this combination, it should be no surprise that Mendelssohn’s Octet in E-flat, Opus 20, is recognized as the outstanding work in the genre, and that it figured on Sunday’s program.

The eight men collaborated very effectively on the piece, maintaining top-grade standards of accuracy and expressing a unified interpretive view. In the finale, where the dizzying passages of rapid notes and complex, eight-part counterpoint would daunt many a fine ensemble, the British-based group exhibited striking virtuosity and capitalized on the score’s inherent dynamism, resulting in an unyielding, crescive momentum that continued until the final bar.

In the preceding movements, a perspicacious sense of balance helped keep textures transparent and allow key melodic material to be heard clearly. Violinist Kenneth Sillito proved an able and sensitive leader; he was joined by violinists Malcolm Latchem, JosefFrohlich and Robert Heard, violists Robert Smissen and Stephen Tees, and cellists Stephen Orton and Roger Smith.

Shostakovich’s Prelude and Scherzo, Opus 11, like the Mendelssohn work, comes from its author’s salad days. Though his relatively popular First Symphony was written during the same period, the composer’s work for string octet lacks the breadth and the wit of the symphony. Nevertheless, the eight musicians brought conviction and drive to this reading.

To open the concert, the ensemble eschewed octets of Spohr and the others in favor of Brahms’ Sextet in G, Opus 36. As elsewhere, individual and ensemble precision remained nearly faultless, and the six players (Sillito and Latchem were the violinists) shared a common vision of the work.

It apparently was a meticulously planned vision, for everything fell into place with mechanical precision. The cost, of course, was a loss of spontaneity, the result an efficient but cool performance.