Music Reviews : Talich Quartet at the Wilshire Ebell

One doesn’t have to speak loudly when one speaks with authority, as Teddy Roosevelt once pointed out. That kind of quiet confidence manifested itself in the performances of the Talich String Quartet in music by fellow countrymen, Smetana and Janacek, Wednesday night on a Music Guild concert at the Wilshire Ebell Theatre.

In Smetana’s First String Quartet, “From My Life,” nothing seemed forced, nothing pushed, everything emerged in a natural flow. The players--Petr Messiereur and Jan Kvapil, violins, Jan Talich, viola, Evzen Rattay, cello--understated their dramatic opening solos yet captured the depth of their meaning. They could pull back the tempo whenever they pleased throughout the movement, yet it never lost its vibrancy or forward motion.

Slight delays in a phrase, an emphasis on an offbeat, abrupt changes of tempo and a joy in rhythm characterized the folk-dance second movement. Messiereur had a way of stopping, or slowing down, his bow in mid-phrase, or mid-note, that made the third movement’s lyricism glow with warmth. Throughout the work, the ensemble showed such nonchalant precision and purpose, that no note, no detail, seemed out of place.

Similarly, the Talich made the sometimes episodic First String Quartet, “Kreutzer Sonata,” by Janacek flow from idea to idea with a stream-of-conscious smoothness. The abrupt and insistent recurrence of the second movement’s main theme emerged as a sly wink of the eye. The quixotic accompaniments, the violent outbursts of emotion were relatively understated; a single climax remained elusive and the piece ended apparently in mid-air.

The group’s performance of Mozart’s String Quartet in D minor, K. 421, unfortunately, proved less authoritative. Here, polished surfaces and polite expression seemed the main point, like an elocution exercise in which P’s and Q’s, and the rain in Spain, are the thing, not the meaning of the phrase. Too dainty.