Lunch-hour concert sustains interest

Press, 24 February 1977, Page 4

Lunch-hour concert sustains interest

The Concert Room at the Arts Centre was filled yesterday for the lunch-hour concert, which had an interesting and well-received programme. Ruth Pearl and Dobbs Franks began the concert Kith Mozart’s Piano and Violin Sonata, K. 302. This began Kith supple and interesting Sow. with strong and rous-! ng passages boiling up and' Ascending in bright cas- ! ■ ides of sound. By way of I rontrast there came an air if fleeting melancholy, and] he two instruments sounded: excellently balanced in this I nil, which has esonant qualities. An air of alm resignation came in the est movement, followed by nirit of embracing generosiv, becoming very joyful torards the end. the players avc the whole sonata a sense f graceful purpose, strongly i! filled. .'•ohn Snelgrove and Dobbs banks played “Proclamation or Trumpet" bv Bloch. This wk was not ideally suited

■ to the building and. at the beginning, sounded somewhat , crudely assertive. This was music of very little “give and take” spirit — and what there was appeared to be of the “Take That(!)” character. It ; all became a little more persuasive towards the end. The new woodwind quintet ended the programme with a work for that medium bv Hindemith. This was a work of widely ranging moods and expressions. It began by bubbling along happily and lightheartedly, sliding round the comers with graceful dexterity. The slow movement had i mysterious music suggesting some imminent catastrophe. In this movement in particular. and throughout the whole work, there were effective and interesting melodies, and chords of arresting and rich placing of the notes. Widely effective use was . made of percussive rhythmic' figures, like “woodpecker” ] challenges. Interest in what was about to happen never sank nor faded. —C. Foster Browne.'