MUSIC REVIEW : LA Fest Opens at Japan America Theatre

The sixth annual Chamber Music/LA Festival is running under the title “French Music and some Mozart, too . . . .” The opening concert, Sunday afternoon at the Japan America Theatre, suggested that the heading indicates not only the festival repertory, but its artistic attitude as well.

After intermission, there was the French component, Ravel’s Piano Trio, in a reading of clear identity and purpose. Violinist and festival director Yukiko Kamei, cellist Jeffrey Solow and pianist Edward Auer worked together effectively in a very deliberate account emphasizing intellectual properties over color and emotional fevers.

The opening movement was taken slowly, but not leisurely. There was a sense of chill, abstracted reverie to the proceedings, which darkened ominously in the Passecaille. There were flashes of sonic warmth, particularly from Solow, but generally the sound matched the steely interpretive stance.

The Pantoum movement and the finale moved vigorously--almost raucously at times. The lean sound and calculating spirit remained, but refocused on pointed rhythmic interplay and sharp contrasts.

This was not the Ravel Trio as most commonly encountered, but a surprisingly plausible and potent one nonetheless, and above all, distinctive.

Entries from Mozart and Beethoven, on the other hand, seemed like preliminary throw-ins. There was nothing really tentative to the performances, but they also demonstrated no compelling reason for being.

Mozart’s “Dissonance” Quartet, K. 465, is no stranger to our halls in any season, and has paid nearly weekly visits in this bicentennial year. Violinists Paul Rosenthal and Kamei, violist Milton Thomas and Solow offered a fuzzy, inconsistent version that was going nowhere memorable even before a long and loud electronic buzz put a stake through the heart of the Andante.

Beethoven’s Piano Quartet in E-flat, Opus 16, is an odd and rarely met concoction, something like a Czerny piano sonata cloaked with a Mozart divertimento. Auer punched out the leading duties neatly enough, and Rosenthal, Thomas and Solow backed him with bright sound and entertaining energy, without finding much beyond curiosity value to the effort.