Concert review: Simon Bolivar Quartet

Published on Sunday 5 September 2010 21:18

Simon Bolivar Quartet *** Queen's Hall, Edinburgh

One trait we can confidently apply to Venezuela's celebrated Simon Bolivar brand is a tendency to favour the showbiz approach – and it wins over audiences without fail. We've seen it in the razzmatazz of the full youth orchestra's carnival-style showpieces; we saw it again on Saturday in the form of the Simon Bolivar Quartet.

It's truly a joy to watch when the music fits the style. Take the numerous encores that these energetic young musicians – section leaders from the mother ship – ended their Queen's Hall recital with: arrangements of South American and Mexican songs, played with a sensuous panache that suited their fearless abandon.

In the main programme, the Bartok-influenced Tiento No 5, by Spanish-born Rodolfo Halffter, also felt comfortable in the hands of a quartet that thrives on collectivist individualism – note the anarchic assertions of the second violinist!

But what of Bach, Brahms and Shostakovich? I've rarely heard their music interpreted so freely, so personally and so driven by lack of preconception.

That can be a good thing, and it was quite extraordinary to hear Shostakovich's quizzically autobiographical Eighth Quartet played with such emotionally open Latin infusion. Not necessarily convincing, more a full-on challenge to accepted convention which replaced gaunt oppression with bullish fervour.

It might have come off, but for recurring inconsistencies within the ensemble – mainly intonation in the middle texture – that rocked moments of Bach's Contrapuntus 1, and seriously maligned Brahms's A minor Quartet.