MUSIC REVIEW : Barber’s “Dover Beach” Proves the Highlight at Concert Overlooking the Sea

Saturday night’s setting for a performance of Samuel Barber’s “Dover Beach” could not have been more congruent. From the portico of St. James Episcopal Church, the Pacific appeared just as calm as the opening lines of Matthew Arnold’s poem portrays the North Sea from the Dover shore.

“Dover Beach” may have been the shortest work on the evening’s program, but it made the most profound impression, largely due to baritone Martin Wright’s heartfelt and subtly modulated singing. Assisted by the Thouvenel String Quartet, Wright declaimed Barber’s dark cadences and Arnold’s brooding verse with an eerie luminescence, although the string players provided him with a buoyant accompaniment of finely woven counterpoint.

Wright’s ample voice favors the darker sonorities, and he pulled out all the stops for this haunting tone poem for voice and string quartet.

The evening began less auspiciously, however, with Thouvenel’s edgy, insecure reading of Mozart’s E-flat Major String Quartet, K. 428, one of the magnificent quartets dedicated to Haydn.

Although first violinist Eugene Purdue displayed an appropriately light, silvery timbre ideal for Mozart, his recurring intonation problems made that virtue a moot point.

The ensemble clearly had a uniform, stylish approach to Mozart’s playful quartet, but it lacked the requisite precise phrasing and clean articulation to make the work sparkle.

After intermission, Thouvenel almost redeemed itself with Beethoven’s C Major Quartet, Op. 59, No. 3. The Texas-based musicians settled into a more fluent mode, sailing through the exultant opening movement with extroverted conviction. Violist Sally Chisholm’s warm, penetrating sonority and limpid phrasing set the standard for the group.

The other members of the Thouvenel Quartet are violinist Janet Chisholm and cellist Rebecca Seiver. Thouvenel’s primary virtue, a pliant unforced lyricism, infused the two inner movements of Beethoven’s Quartet with uncommon grace.

Only the finale’s ebullient fugue momentarily threatened their composure and confidence.