Resol Quartet : 1 November 2025

Sunday in St. John’s Kirk was the first of three 3.00pm concerts this season by Perth Chamber Music – including Perth’s international tenor Liam Bonthrone(18-I-2026).

It was the fourth, return visit from the Resol String Quartet and began with Haydn’s Op.74 No.1. Its first movement combined the elevated and the rustic and had urbane, lofty fun. Serenity and poise characterised their flowing Andantino, different from their rhythmic, surging Minuet, with its introspective, softer Trio. The Finale was extrovert and dashing, at times like one of Haydn’s London Symphonies

Equally emotionally portrayed was the misery of Mendelssohn’s Quartet Op.80. His final work, written after hearing of the death of his beloved sister, it tells of his devastation and affection: two months later he was dead. Jagged tremolos and furious scrubbing slammed up against the Resol’s beautifully lyrical second theme, ending in a furious coda. This did not let up in the ferocious minuet-scherzo with its moping trio. In the Adagio the Resol’s performance was full of Mendelssohn’s smiling through tears – love and loss. No less intense was the Allegro molto Finale: desperation, with a more lyrical theme as troubled recollection. The Resol’s intensity fully served the music.

The Quartet ended with Beethoven Quartet: No.9 in C Major Op.59 No.3. Their mysterious start, burst out into the Major with Beethoven’s joyous joke. It was a Grand Piece with dazzling instrumental sounds, the exciting development requiring brilliant quartet playing. The Andante was a contrastingly gentle serenade of swing and lilt, with a more anxious centre, a Mendelssohnian Song without Words? With fluency of playing, and the charm of an upward swoop, Beethoven looked backwards in his Minuet, though with a perkier Trio. A brilliant virtuoso start of exhilarating energy began Beethoven’s moto perpetuo Finale. Technically a fugue, but… Beethoven is still playing with his hearers in a thrilling, spinning away coda, but it is a false ending – a pause, cleverly brought off by the Resol Quartet, then Beethoven’s surprise, the applause demanding actual end.