Composers’ Turmoil, as Seen by the American String Quartet

Within the familiar pattern of performing pieces from three historical periods, the American String Quartet presented three life-and-death works Friday in Founders Hall at the Orange County Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa.

In these works, Bartok, Schubert and Mozart all addressed issues that had less to do with entertaining anyone than dealing with their own lives and times, and that’s the way the musicians performed them.

Violinists Peter Winograd and Laurie Carney, violist Daniel Avshalomov and cellist David Geber played earnestly and technically at a very high level. Even so, temperamentally, they probed more deeply the ideas of the composer closest to them in time, Bartok, than those of the other two.

Bartok’s Fourth Quartet, usually discussed as the composer’s breakthrough venture in symmetrical arched form, can be seen, too, as a struggle through great turmoil, conflict and historical angst to a final resounding affirmation of the power of life. Certainly these musicians expressed the epic sweep in the music with uncompromising conviction and force.

Schubert composed his “Rosamunde” Quartet (No. 13) after some professional failure and, more critically, his first bout of terrible illness. Unfortunately, only intermittently did the musicians capture his wistfulness and loving backward looks at youth and the lost promise of the future.

Mozart’s G-minor String Quintet, K. 516, took on a tense drive, anger and protest, which are not the usual qualities attributed to this composer though they are present in this complex work. The emotional peak disappointingly came quite late, in the introductory section of the final movement. But at least it came.

Joining the ensemble for this work was Brian Dembow, violist with the Angeles String Quartet.