Colin Jacobsen (Composer), Kojiro Umezaki (Composer), Claude Debussy (Composer), Dmitri Yanov Yanovsky (Composer), John Cage (Composer) Watching Brooklyn Rider play music from its new CD, Dominant Curve, at the colorfully lighted Angel Orensanz Foundation on Monday evening just a few days after seeing the Kronos Quartet at Zankel Hall it was hard not to think about how string quartets have revamped their image in the last quarter century. Once the very symbol of classical music s staidness (however unfair that seemed to anyone who knows the vitality and adventurousness of the repertory), quartets are now unleashing their inner rock bands. Groups like Kronos and Ethel dress casually, play only new music and use amplification and up-to-date sound processing. But even more traditional ensembles have adopted high-energy performing styles. Brooklyn Rider has a trendy veneer, based partly on its interest in music that draws on other cultures and its openness to combining acoustic and electronic sound. But trendiness notwithstanding, this group is ancho-red firmly in the straightforward quartet world. Its program, largely replicating Dominant Curve (In a Circle Records), included new works by Colin Jacobsen, one of the ensemble s violinists; Dmitri Yanov-Yanovsky; and Kojiro Umezaki. But John Cage was represented by an uncharacteristic oldie, the sweetly tonal In a Landscape (1948), augmented here with a subtle electronic overlay by Justin Messina. And the evening s centerpiece was a brisk, intensely focused account of Debussy s G minor Quartet (Op. 10), a 117-year-old work we still think of as vaguely modern. - NY Times
