MAHLER: Piano Quartet (1876); SCHNITTKEe: Piano Quartet (1988); BRAHMS: Piano Quartet No. 1 in G minor (1861) – The Avery Ensemble – Zephyr 001-B, 62:14 ****1/2:
A nostalgic, even winsome opening, a callow development of the theme, a sudden ratcheting of intensity and tempo . . . wait, which piano quartet are we listening to? Is this a lost work of Brahms or Schubert? Neither. It is Mahler’s one movement Piano Quartet (1876), often referred to as “Piano Quartet Movement in A minor.” Barely eleven minutes long, it’s a charming piece, full of youthful yearning (Mahler was 16) and somber exploration. And we usually don’t hear it very often, not even as often as Schubert’s Quartetsatz, a more famous one-movement piece. Too bad. It gives us a glimpse of Mahler we rarely see: the serious youth staring out a full-moon night sky, pining for love and creative fulfillment. Two-thirds into the movement, the adagio softens and drifts like a floating feather. The lead motif returns and disappears in a mysterious two-note pizzicato.
The Avery Ensemble do a marvelous job on this neglected work and kudos to them for recording it. They have also included Alfred Schnittke’s bizarre pastiche on it. In addition to the complete first movement, Mahler apparently wrote 24-measures of a Scherzo, which Schnittke used as a springboard for his six-minute Piano Quartet. Figures from the Mahler fragment recur and are developed and deformed by this entertaining and perverse piece. Like Rendering, Luciano Berio’s take on Schubert’s “10th Symphony,” Schnittke weaves connective tissue around the theme without attempting to compose it like Mahler would have.
The third piece is a workmanlike recording of Brahms’ famous Piano Quartet No. 1 (1861), perhaps one of the inspirations of the young Mahler. I’ve always maintained that the forward momentum of this marvelous work is sufficient to propel one through the most odious of tasks, so I frequently play it while scrubbing pots. The Avery Ensemble appropriately infuses the work with gushing passionate abandon and sensible restraint, particularly in the Andante con moto. This movement contrasts a slow theme of great lyricism and grandeur with a little march that Arnold Schoenberg (in his orchestration) expanded into full military pomp with brass and percussion. Happily, the Avery Ensemble, while paying tribute to Brahms’ militaristic spirit, doesn’t plunge so deeply into it.
— Peter Bates
