[ccfic caption-text format="plaintext"]
By Katrina Margolis
Hometown Weekly Reporter
Music always has been, and continues to be, a great equalizer. It doesn’t matter your age, background, education or socioeconomic status - liking a piece of music can bring people together. This was illustrated perfectly at the performance given by the Borromeo String Quartet in Needham Town Hall last Saturday. The quartet was presented by the Carter Memorial United Methodist Church as a part of their 150th anniversary celebration. In attendance were music appreciators from all over the area, not just Needham. In addition, audience members ranged from the older end of the spectrum to the very young. One girl, about eight or ten, was there with her grandmother.
The Borromeo Quartet is in its 25th year, and is a celebrated musical ensemble. They are the first string quartet to utilize laptop computers on the concert stage in place of traditional sheet music, a technique that allows the musicians to perform solely from four part-scores and composer’s manuscripts. They have been ensemble-in-residence at the New England Conservatory as well as the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum for nearly twenty-three years.
One of the greatest things the Borromeo Quartet did, besides perform incredible music, was break a certain stereotype surrounding classical music. Nicholas Kitchen, the head violinist, introduced each of the pieces before they were played, and he did so with a remarkable sense of humor. The second piece they performed was by Mozart, which was accompanied by an historical anecdote. “Some people say that Mozart’s father exploited him, inviting people over to watch him play. However, Mozart’s father would say, I can’t stop him from playing, so people may as well watch!” The audience chuckled with laughter, whisking away the idea that classical music has to be a stuffy, serious business.
The program they played included musicians who were in communication with each other. In fact, the pieces chosen represented direct contact between the composers. “The importance of friendship and respect is something that is really wonderful to celebrate in the concert that happens tonight. Because Haydn and Mozart are people that could have been rivals of one another, they could have had all sort of attitudes with each other, but in fact, they couldn’t have been deeper friends and they helped each other out in a way,” Kitchen explained. “They absolutely shared every single secret they knew with each other and helped each other achieve the most beautiful compositions, so it’s very special to share with you the Haydn piece and then the Mozart piece that follows.”
The second piece the quartet played, Mozart’s String Quartet No. 19 in C Major was, in fact, written for Haydn. The respect Mozart had for his fellow composer could be seen in the edits and detailed revisions on Mozart’s manuscript. “We have this myth that Mozart never edited, he visualized a piece in his head and then wrote it done, and to some extent this is true,” Kitchen said. “But when it came to this piece, you can see that he is sweating. He really wanted to make a good impression on Haydn and to present him with a beautiful composition.”
The pieces chosen highlighted the incredible conversation and collaboration within the quartet. All four instruments at times sounded as if they were one, and the ebb and flow of the melodies and harmonies were presented with an intricacy that was made to seem nearly easy when undertaken by such skilled musicians.
