Last Night I went to the last in the Winter Series of Quartets at
Leamington Spa. I was expecting to hear the Mandelring Quartet playing
Haydn, Debussy and a quartet by Onslow. I was looking forward to that as
I have never heard of Onslow. However one of the ladies in the Mandelring
is just about to become a mother so they were replaced by the ConTempo
Quartet. (Bogdan Sofei violin, Ingrid Nicola violin, Andreea Banciu viola,
Adrian Mantu cello - all in their late 20s)

I would like to pay tribute to the ConTempo Quartet who are Romanian (when
did we drop the u?) and founded in 1995 and have won several International
Prizes including the audience prize last April at the London International
String Quartet Competition.  See:

   http://www.musicweb.uk.net/SandH/2000/apr00/quartetcompetition.htm

They are currently in residence at Aldeburgh where they had an afternoon
concert yesterday. They then travelled to Leamington by train arriving at
6.30. Just time to grab a sandwich before playing and then straight off
again by train.  I doubt they had a hot meal all day. What do we do to
young musicians!  Nevertheless thay gave a sparkling performance of Haydn's
Sunrise quartet (Op76, No4), which I really must add to my collection,
followed by the Enesco Quartet Op22 No2 (again when did we drop the u).
Following the Haydn this was a tough work with the first movement requiring
the closest attention. As with all great works the difficulties seemed to
disappear as the movements progressed. After the interval they played the
Brahms Quartet in B flat Op67. I am sure they played this well but I found
the work totally lacking interest and unable to hold my attention. I had no
problem with the Haydn minuet encore so, for me, the fault lay with Brahms.
[Ripostes anticipated]

Len Mullenger
Founder of MusicWeb
www.musicweb.uk.net