The evening of Monday, March 31st saw a well-rounded gathering of music patrons as well as Stern Sense of Music students at the Yeshiva University Museum, all anticipating a night of music provided by The Momenta String Quartet. The quartet, also known as the Beatrice Diener Ensemble-in-Residence, consists (as the name would suggest) of four members: Emilie-Anne Gendron, Adda Kridler, Stephanie Griffin, and Michael Haas – two violins, viola, and cello respectively.
The first half of the performance saw pieces by three different composers, each using a different combination of instruments. The first piece, Morphic Resonance (2013), was a lesson in atonal composition. Composer Adam Rudolph (b. 1955) described his piece as utilizing “emotional colorations of sound, unusual relationships of rhythm against rhythm and form against form.” Resonance was composed specifically for the Momenta Quartet, and this fact was evident in their performance; every player seemed to have a strong handle on their part and the way the four players bowed their instruments created a beautiful visual.
The second piece, Above Clouds (2013/14), by Ursula Mamlok (b. 1923), was the first World Premier of the evening. A sparse piano part, played by Cheryl Seltzer, accentuated the piece for piano and viola. In her commentary on the piece, Mamlok revealed that she, too, had composed her piece specifically for the players Seltzer and Griffin. Again, the musicians’ mastery of the work was evident in their confident, unified playing.
The third piece, Sonata de Concert, Op. 47 (1856), created a stark contrast with the two works preceding it. A piano and cello piece performed by Yelena Grinberg and Mr. Haas, this work by Charles-Valentin Alkan (1813-1888) departed obviously from the post-modern atonality of Rudolph and Mamlok, instead grounding firmly in musical Romanticism. Described in the program as “among the most difficult and ambitious pieces in the romantic cello and piano repertoire,” Grinberg and Haas lent a passionate emotion to the piece, giving off a frenetic feel at moments, so that by the end of the final movement (“Finale alla salterella: Prestissimo”), the auditorium thundered with applause.
By the end of the intermission, Sense of Music students (along with the music patrons in attendance), hurried back to their seats for the most anticipated portion of the evening: the second World Premier of the night – a composition by Stern’s Associate Professor and head of the music department, Dr. David Glaser. The piece, String Quartet No. 3 (2014), echoed the atonal styles of the first two pieces in the program. Glaser’s String Quartet, however, followed a more modernist approach in its composition. The ten-minute long work, instead of being clearly divided into traditional movements, is instead written as one long movement, with separations and divisions based on tempo and sound quality. Although perhaps not as agreeable to the untrained ear as the Romanticism of Charles-Valentin Alkan, the instruments played off each other beautifully and Dr. Glaser’s work was well-received, garnering as much applause as the piano and cello duet.
The evening ended on a people-pleasing note with a piece by Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847), String Quartet in E-flat, Op. 12 (1829). Though not as rousing as the Alkan piece, the Momenta Quartet played the four-movement piece with feeling.
This evening of music was purported to celebrate Jewish composers, and celebrate it did. Jews have always had a close connection with music; from King David and his harp to Irving Berlin and George Gershwin. However, what tonight proved was that the intellectual, and not just the sensual, side of music is still alive and thriving, right here in our community.