Bergamot Quartet - "In the Brink" album review
Bergamot Quartet - In the Brink
All in all, the Bergamot Quartet's debut album successfully presents premiere recordings of new works by their group of top-notch performers. While not all the pieces are equally captivating, Bergamot still creates music with extreme technical skill and intense dedication to the support of new music.
In the Brink, the Bergamot Quartet's debut album, showcases premiere recordings of four works for string quartet. The album features music by mid-career composers Paul Wiancko, Tania León, and Suzanne Farrin, as well as the titular, four-part work, "In the Brink", by violinist/composer Ledah Finck, a co-founder of the quartet. The ensemble makes a solid attempt to introduce new music into the string quartet's contemporary canon (listen to the album here).
Wiancko's Ode on a Broken Loom launches off the album with musical narrative of densely weaving threads. Bergamot gets a chance to show off their technical chops and impeccable sense of rhythm, allowing Wiancko's tightly imitative gestures to be as effective as they can be. The music itself comprises of engaging material organized into three distinct motivic sections. By the end of the piece, the quartet quickly reprises each theme in a stereotypical flashy ending. The form, while traditional and basic, leads the audience through the work and creates an easy listening for an otherwise crowded soundworld. However, this is telling of a larger trend in Wiancko's music, which is that it straddles the line between complexity and popular post-minimalism, often in a manner which distracts from both rather than serving either one.
The three-movement work, Esencia, explores Caribbean and Latin American music of León's background. All three movements are filled with lyrical melodies and contrasting rhythmic sections, standard in all of León's work. Bergamot again gets a chance to show off their strength of ensemble blend and rhythmic integrity, aspects ever rarer to find in a string ensemble. Despite the performance, the work simply comes across as a piece which is more entertaining for the performers than the audience. León's traditional harmonic and rhythmic world, while beautiful in short bursts, seldom varies or expands into anything exceptional.
Undecim, by New York composer Suzanne Farrin, is the true gem on the album. I, for one, am incredibly grateful to Bergamot for promoting Farrin and her music, as I was completely unfamiliar with her prior to their album release. Undecim is comprised of ten sections presented together in one movement. The work alternates between full ensemble and solo sections, allowing all four individuals to have their own time in the limelight. Farrin uses the piece to explore the concept of memory, specifically within the context of the vast classical canon of string quartet repertoire. The music, while inspired by the idea of previous repertoire, makes no attempt at a poor emulation or mockery, and in fact creates an engaging work, climaxing with the buzz of piercing harmonics.
The Bergamot Quartet is joined by percussionist Terry Sweeney on drumset for the final work on the album, Finck's In the Brink. Finck proves herself as both a composer and performer on the album, creating an emotional four-part work using the quartet, drumset, and the ensemble members' voices. In the Brink starts off with a post-minimalist sound which continuously expands into an exploration of the human experience with intricately scored extended techniques. Certain sections of the music, especially in the first two movements, would benefit from either more fluid transitions or just longer amounts of time spent on one idea, so that it can be fully explored before simply moving on to the next one.
The most aurally striking aspect of listening to the entire album is the awkward change when listening to Finck's In the Brink. It is recorded and mixed by someone different than the first three pieces, and the contrast in recording quality and sound is strikingly off-putting. It is disappointing because it does the music a serious disservice, especially when compared to album's earlier tracks.
All in all, the Bergamot Quartet's debut album successfully presents premiere recordings of new works by their group of top-notch performers. While not all the pieces are equally captivating, Bergamot still creates music with extreme technical skill and intense dedication to the support of new music.
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