High level of musicianship from Primrose Piano Quartet (From The Westmorland Gazette)

High level of musicianship from Primrose Piano Quartet

9:10am Sunday 4th December 2011 in Gig and concert reviews By Brian Paynes

Primrose Piano Quartet

Kendal Town Hall

Among the attractions that the Kendal Midday Concert Club has for its members is the frequency with which they are introduced to unfamiliar works and composers. Some will have been familiar with Faure’s Piano Quartet Op 15 but very few will have encountered H Y Hurlstone’s Piano Quartet Op 43 prior to the recent performances by the Primrose Piano Quartet.

The town hall’s variable acoustic, when required to deal with balance within ensembles like piano quartets, often favours the piano – the poor pianist, though the important linchpin of the group, is too loud. The Primrose’s performances did not suffer this indignity: throughout balance was generally satisfactory and the beauty inherent in the string parts was audible to all.

Hurlstone wrote effectively for strings and during the work there was much lovely interplay between the three of them; when the occasion demanded they blended successfully with their sensitive partner.

The wide emotion range found in the Faure was convincingly portrayed; the warm-hearted first movement, the playful scherzo, the serene slow movement and the barn-storming finale were all attractively presented with a high level of musicianship.