Bronzi, Vogler String Quartet at the Imma, Dublin
A coincidence of programming in Dublin allowed a few roving concert-goers the rare chance to hear performances of two different early 20th-century sonatas for unaccompanied cello at two different concerts. First up was William Butt with a masterful account of the Kodály Sonata in the Hugh Lane Gallery. Then, at the Irish Museum of Modern Art, it was the turn of Enrico Bronzi – cellist with the excellent Trio di Parma – to do a guest spot with the Vogler String Quartet, all courtesy of promoter John Ruddock's AML.
Bronzi's piece was the 1922 Sonata for Solo Cello by Hindemith. It is devoid of the innovative plucking, chording and harmonics of the Kodály work, and instead establishes its 20th-century sound world via Hindemith's post-romantic harmony, an almost menacing rhythmic vitality, and dissonance.
For these last two qualities, which predominate in the outer movements of this short five-movement work, Bronzi combined great lyrical smoothness with a gripping intensity which itself seemed to border almost on the aggressive. He deployed a different sort of intensity at the heart of the work – a soulful, quiet slow movement – followed by a scherzo which Hindemith intended to be played "without any expression". It was a commanding performance likely to have won new friends for a rarely heard piece.
Bronzi then joined with the Vogler String Quartet, to whom he subordinated his individual solo strengths as the second cello in Schubert's great Quintet in C. We, of course, know what Schubert may well not have known, that he would be dead within weeks of completing this warm, life-affirming masterpiece. So if we listen to it as a musical farewell, that's a choice made by us even if probably not by the composer. Bronzi and the Voglers seemed to play beyond that issue, simply relishing all its wonderful beauty and surprises and character.
The concert opened with Beethoven's quartet, Opus 18 No 3, argued by some to be his first – and not his third – essay in the genre. Although the piece maintains the formal conventions of Haydn, the voice within is unmistakably Beethoven's, something the Voglers seemed to enjoy underlining in an affectionate and lively performance.
MICHAEL DUNGAN
