Kronos Proves Adept at Recycling

Four of the six works on the Kronos Quartet’s latest Southland concert happened to be repetitions from previous visits by the much-admired San Francisco ensemble. Yet no one in the grateful audience Saturday night at the Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts seemed to mind.

And why not? There is nothing wrong in recycling repertory; works by John Adams, Ken Benshoof, Harry Partch and Franghiz Ali-Zadeh all deserved the spotlight. The others, Mario Lavista’s “Musica para mi Vecino” (1995) and Terry Riley’s “The Ecstasy” from “Salome Dances for Peace” (1986), added spice to the program.

One still must quibble with Kronos’ unnecessary use of amplification, and with its complete blackout of the audience, which sometimes results in the listener wondering exactly what is being played at a given moment.

But these are philosophical subjects. More important, perhaps, is the devotion of the four players--violinists David Harrington and John Sherba, violist Hank Dutt and cellist Joan Jeanrenaud--to gifted and living composers and their musical projection of that devotion. Particularly admirable on Saturday were the tightness and sensibilities of the program.

Lavista’s economical but effective five-movement suite explored the quartet medium thoroughly but in airy instrumental textures; one wants to hear it again, soon. Riley’s “Salome” excerpt busied the observer’s ear as well as the players’ craft.

The joyous overture to this program was selections from Adams’ “John’s Book of Alleged Dances”; its postlude was Michael Daugherty’s silly but amusing “Elvis Everywhere,” played as an encore.