The Well-Tempered Ear
Classical music: The UW-Madison’s Pro Arte Quartet opens its new season in top form
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By Jacob Stockinger
On Friday night in Mills Hall, in an all-masterpiece program that featured Classical, Romantic and Modernist works, the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Pro Arte Quartet (below, in a photo by Rick Langer) opened its new season .
And it did so in top form. The Ear came away with one thought: You just can’t find better chamber music in Madison — and it’s free!
In the “Sunrise” Quartet in B-flat Major, Op. 76, No. 4, by Franz Joseph Haydn, the Pro Arte exhibited the ideal Classical style with its balance, voicing and clarity.
The sunrise motif proved utterly convincing and evocative. Particularly noteworthy was how the group highlighted the dissonances in the Classical era’s slow movement. (Hear it in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
The interpretation offered more proof that when the work is consonant, you play for the dissonance; and when the work is dissonant, you play for the consonance.
In the short, non-stop Quartet No. 7 in F-sharp minor, Op. 108, by Dmitri Shostakovich, The Ear was impressed by how the Pro Arte teased out the remnants of late Russian Romanticism that creep into the mostly modernist works of Shostakovich and Prokofiev.
Also remarkable was how the Pro Arte highlighted the structure and counterpoint that Shostakovich, a devotee of Bach, brought to his modernism. This seemed a softer and more lyrical Shostakovich, less strident or percussive, than you often hear. And the approach worked beautifully to engage the listener.
And then came the grand finale done grandly: the late Beethoven Quartet No. 15 in A minor, Op. 132. The quartet unraveled the often perplexing and thick texture; the epic length; and the forward-looking compositional methods.
The Pro Arte used a low-key and restrained approach that only highlighted the heart-rending lyricism of the “Heiliger Dangesang,” or Sacred Hymn of Thanksgiving, that the aging Beethoven composed when he had recovered from what he thought might be a fatal illness.
How fitting! The perfectly planned program started with one dawn by the teacher and ended with another dawn by the student.
Madison keeps getting more new chamber music groups, all very accomplished and all very good. But the Pro Arte Quartet — now in its 106th season of existence and its 78th season in residence at the UW-Madison — is still tops. As one fan said in near disbelief, “That concert was out of this world.” He wasn’t alone as the performance drew a prolonged standing ovation and loud bravos from the two-thirds house.
When it comes to chamber music, you just can’t do better than the Pro Arte Quartet. It’s that simple. With such quality and affordability, the Pro Arte should always be playing to a full house.
The Pro Arte Quartet will repeat the same program on Sunday afternoon, Oct. 7, at 12:30 p.m. for “Sunday Afternoon Live at the Chazen.” Admission to the Brittingham Gallery 3 performance space is free, and the concert will be streamed live. Go here for details and a link:
And the dates and times — without programs — of future Pro Arte Quartet concerts can be found here: https://www.music.wisc.edu/pro-arte-quartet/
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Classical music: The UW-Madison’s Pro Arte Quartet – music’s oldest string quartet — will play a FREE concert of late quartets by Haydn, Beethoven and Shostakovich this Friday night
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By Jacob Stockinger
Clocking in at over 100 years old, the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Pro Arte Quartet (below in a photo by Rick Langer) is the longest-lived string quartet in the history of music.
Current members are (from left) David Perry and Suzanne Beia, violins; Sally Chisholm, viola; and Parry Karp, cello.
Ever since it was founded in Brussels, Belgium in 1912 and then in 1938 found refuge from World War II as the first musical artists-in-residence at the UW-Madison (or anywhere), the Pro Arte has had the reputation of commissioning and championing living composers and new works. Such composers, whose works they also premiered, include Samuel Barber, Bela Bartok, Darius Milhaud, Arthur Honegger, Frank Martin and many others.
Here is a link with some of its background:
https://www.music.wisc.edu/event/pro-arte-quartet-4/
And here is a link to a more expanded history of the Pro Arte, along with a schedule of concerts this season:
https://www.music.wisc.edu/pro-arte-quartet/
But the Pro Arte Quartet (below, performing at Carnegie Hall in a photo by Rick Langer) is also unparalleled in performing the classics of the quartet repertoire.
You can hear that for yourself this coming Friday night at 8 p.m. in Mills Hall, when they will play a FREE concert of three quartets that came late in the composers’ careers.
The quartet will perform the famous and aptly nicknamed “Sunrise” String Quartet in B-flat Major, Op. 76, No. 4, by Franz Joseph Haydn; the late Beethoven String Quartet No. 15 in A minor, Op. 132, with its “Heiliger Dankgesang” – or “Sacred Hymn of Thanksgiving” (which you can hear and see graphically depicted in the YouTube video at the bottom); and the String Quartet No. 7, Op. 108, by Dmitri Shostakovich.
The Ear thinks the program is hard to beat for either experienced string quartets listeners or for newcomers to the genre.
He bets you will too.
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