Trio Navarro

TRIO NAVARRO TURNS QUARTET AT SSU

Season-ending chamber music concerts, especially in the spring, often feature repertoire of a less-demanding nature, light as May breezes. The Trio Navarro would have none of that at their May 17 concert, programming two massive piano quartets, both demanding focus and stamina from the performers and the 60 listeners in Sonoma State’s Ives Hall.

Adding the wonderful violist Nancy Ellis to their longstanding ensemble, the Navarro plunged first into the Piano Quartet of William Walton, written in 1919 when the composer was only 17. It’s an assured work, filled with the harmonic language of Ravel and the drive of a lesser-known Gallic composer, Louis Vierne, whose great Piano Quintet mirrors the dynamism of the Walton as much as Ravel’s rich intervals. The presence of the viola, and perhaps the close proximity of the shell to the piano, made for a better sonic balance than the usual emphasis on low (mostly cello) frequencies in Ives 119. Roy Malan’s violin high tessitura sounded radiant, particularly at the end of the opening Allegramente movement , where his telling five-note phrase over cello and viola pizzicato provided a breathtaking reprise from the tumult.

Stridency continued in the Allegro Scherzando, with a three-instrument string fugue, led by cellist Jill Brindel. Pianist Marilyn Thompson finally entered with an orchestral sound. The Navarro caught the menacing nature of the music, announced by a descending triad and continuing with another fugue to the finish. There is little connection with any other composer here, the writing demonic and wholly individual.

The lyrical third movement was totally different, with strumming arpeggios from the piano. Brindel’s cello sang a lovely theme, handing it off to Ellis’s viola, and there was just an echo of Vaughan William’s “Lark Ascending” from Malan’s elegant violin.

The finale returned to tone-cluster outbursts from the piano, and to rhythms that paralleled Stravinsky’s Petrouchka. Here the Trio’s interplay of line was superb, the bright acoustics of Ives contributing to the impact. Sforzandos in the piano’s bass came thick and fast, an accession to the thunder of Walton’s conception. This was a striking performance of a rarely played piano quartet, and bravos from the audience were plentiful.

Following intermission, the Navarro presented another piano quartet, the Op. 26 Brahms in A Major. The opening theme from the piano continued the dense textures of the Walton but added masterful counterpoint. The tempos were leisurely, but the momentum was never lost, with Thompson’s piano line sensuously underpinning the strings. Everything was serene in the Poco Adagio, pedal points in the piano and heart-on-sleeve romanticism lending a nostalgic air to the movement. There are big contrasts and thematic equality in this movement, and the Navarro made the most of them, with the cello frequencies sometimes being felt on my feet, planted firmly on the wood risers at the back of the room.

The Scherzo’s “question and answer” sections were a premonition of the rambunctious, ardently played Finale. The Brahms is a long work, and coming after the Walton, it stretched the listener’s attention. Nonetheless, I found the reading convincing.

Closing a three-concert SSU season, the Navarro’s virtuosic performance gave no reason to alter my view that this is the finest resident piano trio (with estimable guest performers) in Northern California.