Invigorating Chamber Program by Jacques Thibaud String Trio

There’s pressure enough on touring classical ensembles, yet the members of the young Jacques Thibaud String Trio make it even tougher on themselves by insisting upon playing programs entirely from memory. Well, mostly from memory, for they did bring out music stands for the Mozart Oboe Quartet K. 370 / 368b at their Chamber Music in Historic Sites concert at the Doheny Mansion on Friday night. But that’s OK; they’re entitled to relax the high-wire act whenever they please.

Burkhard Maiss produced a rather darkish tone from his violin, which made for a remarkably homogenous blend with Philip Douvier’s viola and Uwe Hirth-Schmidt’s cello. They were not a seamless ensemble on this tour-ending date--Maiss in particular had some problems with intonation--but they grappled meaningfully and sometimes fiercely with the program, giving the music a solid rhythm and vitality that is preferable to soulless perfection any time.

In the Mozart, we were able to hear the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra’s superb principal oboist Allan Vogel weave an ingratiating thread around the three stringed instruments, dancing gingerly and gracefully while imparting all kinds of subtle coloring. Max Reger’s String Trio in A minor Opus 77b at first supports the composer’s reputation for intense, chromatic, Romantic angst, but then Reger suddenly breaks out a wicked grin with a lusty Scherzo that sounds like a satire on Schubert and a finale full of in-jokes.

The Thibauds brought a welcome youthful vehemence to Beethoven’s String Trio in C minor, Opus 9, No. 3, leaning into the notes to the point where parts of the Scherzo teetered on a dangerously manic edge. And that energy spilled over into the encore, the Minuet from Beethoven’s Serenade, Opus 8.