Armadillo’s Competition Proves a Sound Investment

Invest in classical music. That’s what the Armadillo String Quartet and the Pacific Composers Forum decided to do with the cash surplus from their concert of Peter Schickele’s music last season.

One string quartet competition later, they named three winners (out of 32 entrants statewide), and performed them Thursday night in Pasadena’s Neighborhood Church.

Blake Neely’s 10-minute “Episode” was awarded first prize. Cast in three contiguous movements (“Prologue,” “Incident” and “Penance”), the work proceeds through the sickness and decline of a cancer patient. We hear the wheezing inhale and exhale, the sudden jabbing pains and emotional agitation, the restored tranquillity but inevitable descent, with memories twittering above. Though in a modern extended tonality, the story is told in a way Richard Strauss would recognize. “Episode” is not afraid of immediacy.

In David Lefkowitz’s “Four Works: Exhibited,” a runner-up, musical substance was given to abstract Expressionist paintings by Clyfford Still, Mark Rothko, Barnett Newman and Jackson Pollock. Of the three engaging movements played this night, the Rothko--a slow, soft haze, bow hairs dragging pianissimo--seemed a particularly effective likeness.

Lior Rosner’s String Quartet, the other runner-up, showed a strong allegiance to Shostakovich (not a bad allegiance) with its severe counterpoints, ruggedly jostling rhythms and, in the finale, a Jewish theme.

The Armadillo performed them all with sustained concentration and knowing sensitivity. The group closed with Charles Ives’ early String Quartet No. 1, a collection of hymn tunes tricked up with bookish counterpoint and flimflamming harmonic turns. It riffs, but doesn’t go anywhere.