New Hollywood Has Become a Stand-Up Quartet

The Music Guild’s spinoff series, Coffee, Cakes & Chamber Music on a Sunday Afternoon, drew a fairly substantial turnout at Brentwood’s University Synagogue over the weekend, perhaps lured by the marquee value of the New Hollywood String Quartet.

It’s probable that many in the audience remember the original Hollywood String Quartet, wondering how these guys stack up against the legend.

It turns out that the New Hollywood has become a formidable team only about 1 1/2 years after its debut concert. These studio players blend together as seamlessly and often as sumptuously as do more seasoned quartets, with painstaking care in the shaping of virtually every phrase.

Also, as of two or three months ago, violinists Clayton Haslop and Rafael Rishik and violist David Walther have started to play standing up (with cellist Paul Cohen remaining seated), joining the Emerson Quartet in a striking departure from business as usual.

They look good doing so--especially Haslop, whose tall, lean frame sways dramatically backward as he plays--and one wonders whether the sound is affected, for the group had a remarkably even balance with no one voice dominating.

There is artistic growth too. The first movement of the Schubert Quartet No. 13 (“Rosamunde”) was a bit faster, more sharply characterized, and it breathed more deeply than on a recording made in September 2000.

Sometimes, however, they apply too much polish; the finale of the Schubert could have used more of a rhythmic kick.

The Beethoven Quartet No. 6 evolved from a tightly classical first movement to absorbing dialogues in the finale, and spurts of drive emerged through the refined textures in Dvorak’s Quartet No. 14.

While it doesn’t try to sound like the original, the New Hollywood is certainly up to the task of maintaining its predecessor’s high technical and musical standards.