Review Excerpts

“…completely attuned to one another, and also to the subtleties of the music they play.” — The Washington Post

“Their performance was magnificent.” — Diario del Sureste (Mexico)

“A sense of conviction energizes their perfect technique; their enthusiasm never clouds the precision of their performance.” — La Marseillaise (France)

“…skillful playing…the Fauré was imbued with appropriate languor and luminous Gallic warmth.” — The New York Times

“On the purely technical level, they are as cohesive an ensemble as one could imagine. And their overall approach is of the deep-probing sort, as sensible as it is sensual.” — St. Louis Post-Dispatch

“Assessing the Ames Piano Quartet’s performance presents no problem and no equivocation. It was superb!” — Buffalo News

“The audience was clearly moved, and brought the musicians back for three ovations…” — The Post-Journal

“The Ames Piano Quartet’s interpretation was superlative, with only the kind of rubati and expressive playing only a full-time chamber group can get.” — Palm Beach Daily News

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Saint Paul Sunday, Joseph Suk
The piano quartet heard November 7 on Saint Paul Sunday was the first official work — Opus 1 — of one of the most gifted Czech composers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries and the composer who, even in his own lifetime, was hailed as the successor to the great Antonín Dvorák. Josef Suk was born in Krecovice in 1874 and entered the Prague Conservatory in 1885 to study violin and composition, and his piano quartet was a piece written as his examination composition in 1891. He stayed on at the conservatory for a further year in order to study chamber music and composition with Dvorák, who had joined the faculty in early 1891. In fact, Suk had been allowed to go ahead with his composition while all the other students worked on developing a musical theme set by Dvorák — and when Dvorák first heard the slow middle movement, he walked up to Suk, kissed him, and said, “chlapik!” (fine fellow!). Suk soon became Dvorák’s favorite pupil and in 1898 married Dvorák’s daughter Otilie, with whom he had a very happy family life.

Despite his clear ability and avid quartet playing (he appeared in more than 4,000 concerts with the Czech Quartet over the course of 40 years), Suk composed relatively little chamber music. He is instead best known for his orchestral works, including the famous “Asrael” symphonic poem cycle begun after the death of Antonín Dvorák in 1905. His own wife Otilie died shortly thereafter. The losses were shattering to Suk and influenced his music ever after. The four segments of the cycle — Asrael, A Summer’s Tale, The Ripening, and Epilogue — were written over the course of nearly 30 years and are considered some of his finest and most eloquent works, reflecting his own inner struggles and rivaling Mahler in their structural form and emotional energy.

Despite his association with Dvorák, Suk was not influenced by Czech folk music or literature and instead developed a highly individual approach, full of self-quotation and personal symbolism which reflected his rich inner life and imagination. His early compositions, such as the Opus 1 piano quartet, were written in a sensuous Romantic style, and much of his most loved works (his Serenade for Strings, a number of songs and the beautiful incidental music for Raduz and Mahulena, for example) come from this early period. In later life his style became more complex, even bordering on atonality. Suk taught advanced composition at the Prague Conservatory from 1922 and trained more than 35 composers, including Bohuslav Martinu. Josef Suk died near Prague in 1935. A grandson, also named Josef Suk [www.transartuk.com/suk/] (b. 1929) is an acclaimed violinist.

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Chamber Quartet Charms as It Closes Flagler Series
Palm Beach Daily News, Wednesday, April 07, 2004,  Marcio Bezerra
The Flagler Museum Music Series’ fifth season came to an end Monday featuring a rarity among chamber music ensembles – a piano quartet. Consisting of violin, viola, cello and piano, it is not usual to find a group exclusively dedicated to that genre.
Although there are many great works for the formation, they are usually performed by string trios or quartets (which then have a guest pianist) or piano trios (with a guest violist).

The Ames Piano Quartet has established itself as one of the few groups of its kind in the world. The advantages of having a continual ensemble were clearly evident at Whitehall. Their ensemble synchronization when it came to articulation, tempi and dynamics was truly exceptional.

They started the program with Ludwig van Beethoven’s Quartet for Piano and Strings in E Flat, Op. 16. An early work, it blends well the melodic lines typical of Mozart with a more Haydnesque sense of development.

Overall, the work received a satisfying reading, although the overly reverberant acoustics of the music room at Whitehall stressed the basses too much, compromising the lightness called for by the piece’s style.

Pianist William David was the star in the first and last movement, while Jonathan Sturm (viola) and George Work (cello) impressed by their full tone and control of melodic lines in the middle movement.

The next piece on the program was the little-heard Piano Quartet in A minor, Op. 66 by Charles-Marie Widor. Better known for his organ pieces, Widor was an important teacher at the Paris Conservatory at the turn of the 20th century. His works have the clarity one expects from the French, mixed with a religiosity that, in the case of the piano quartet, is symbolized by the use of old church modes in conjunction with the diatonic scale.

Although the work received an outstanding rendition by the Ames Piano Quartet, its limitations were obvious from the onset, especially the rather forced drama of its outer movements. It was, nevertheless, a charming composition, but no more than that.
The audience’s expectation for a more substantial work was fulfilled in the second part, which featured the Piano Quartet in G minor, Op. 25 by Johannes Brahms. Premiered in 1862, this is an early work that has already many characteristics of the mature Brahms —unconventional melodies, striking rhythmic patterns, a love for the kitsch world of gypsy music, and, above all, a sense of form unheard of since the days of Beethoven.

The Ames Piano Quartet’s interpretation was superlative, with the kind of rubati and expressive playing only a full-time chamber group can get. Their rendition of the famous last movement (Rondo alla Zingarese) was inebriating: at times, they sounded like a gypsy street band. They, as well as the Flagler Museum Music Series, surely deserved a standing ovation for a memorable concert.