Following a String of Inspirations

Every so often things are done right in the musical world, and the first of these two CDs is an instance. Aaron Kernis’ Second String Quartet (“musica instrumentalis”) is a terrific piece. It won the Pulitzer Prize in 1998, and a terrific recording of it has duly followed. Kernis, who was born in 1960, is the perfect example of the American composer for whom too much is never quite enough, as he piles his pieces high with his enthusiasms. The quartet is intoxicated with Baroque dance forms: The first movement is a lush, rhapsodic hash of them; the second is a slow, intensely personal rapt sarabande; the Finale out-fugues the last movement of Beethoven’s third “Rasumovsky” quartet.

The Lark, which has changed all but one of its members since it commissioned Kernis’ First Quartet (“musica celestis”) in 1990, sounds rich and fleshy. Its original recording of the First Quartet (with its ecstatic slow movement) was strong, but this new one, better recorded and with more intense playing, adds yet another dimension to the piece.

The other new Kernis disc is a miscellany of minor works from the ‘80s and early ‘90s. Included, along with the flashy movements from Marinetti’s’ “The Futurist Cookbook” for narrator and ensemble, are the haunting minimalist “Meditation” for violin and piano written in memory of John Lennon, a lovely Air for violin and piano and the sentimental “Before Sleep and Dreams” for piano. In short it is a disc of Kernis all-over-the-place. The performances by the Eberli, which includes Kernis’ wife, pianist Evelyne Luest, are quite fine, although clarinetist Evan Spritzer’s breathless Marinetti narration is not powerful.

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