I'd heard this group before, though not for many years. (3 of them are still the same people.) They once played a marvelous all-Schubert program at Herbst, where I heard them this time. Again there was some Schubert, a light and soft-spoken rendition of the "Rosamunde" Quartet.
The other major work was a piano quintet written by the pianist, Timo Andres. It was called The Great Span because he likened its shape to a suspension bridge, as it was in ABA format with an extended B (and a very brief A', but he didn't mention that). The A section had the strings playing little mechanical figures for a few seconds, then switching to different mechanical figures, intriguing but bloodless. In the B section the strings laid down long quiet notes while the piano would drop little tinkling figures above them. Figure, pause, another figure, as if it were breathing, making the whole thing sound like a children's edition of Morton Feldman (for one thing it moved much faster than Feldman as well as being more consonant).
Andres also played a solo piano piece by Ann Southam, confessing that didn't know why she titled it Remembering Schubert, though he suggested it sounded a little like the piano accompaniment to some of his songs. He described it as minimalist, but its procedure of sequential arpeggiated chords sounded to me more New Age.
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