TangoFugue

Pythagoras Quartet at St Martin's in the Fields

Pythagoras Quartet:
Mark Lee and Nuño Carapina violin; Clifton Harrison viola;
Marie Girbal cello

First heard at the Royal Academy of Music, this brilliantly conceived debut concert of the innovative Pythagoras Quartet of London (what a brilliant choice for a string quartet's name - though there is already another in Holland) was repeated at St Martin-in-the-Fields 3 Feb before a capacity audience of some 250 !

Simultaneously, at the Academy itself in Marylebone, there was another free Friday orchestral concert, likely to have attracted a similar sized audience. Lunch-time concerts all over London are increasingly popular and well attended, possibly related to difficulty in evening transport?

Throughout term time there continue to be uniquely valuable and enjoyable public events at the Royal Academy, almost day by day - see http://www.ram.ac.uk/events. Alternating Piazzolla arrangements for string quartet with contrapuntal classics made fugues from The Art of Fugue far more digestible by a mixed aaudience than playing them all staright through and this polcy of mixing opposites bids fair for the group's success.

If you've missed them twice, there is a further opportunity to encounter this programme (surely destined for a CD?) on 22nd February, 1:00 PM at St George's Church, Hanover Square; recommended.

Peter Grahame Woolf