Double Quartet: Strings and Spaces

As we are herded into the Concert Hall, what first strikes me as unusual is that our assigned seating is in chairs laid out on the stage. We face backwards, towards the seating area, no audience in sight. The theater darkens, and the audience is left mystified at the apparent lack of any performers. The lights turn on, and it is realized that the Formosa Quartet is positioned at the very rear of the concert hall, at the very top of the highest balcony. An interesting reversal, but the basic relationship between musician and listener is preserved. They proceed to open up the night’s showing with Joseph Haydn’s String Quartet in E-flat Major, Op. 76, No. 6, 2nd Movement. A soft, sonorous, mellow piece, it has a powerful sound but lacks the energy and impact to work as the very first thing we hear. We’re quickly shuffled off to EMPAC’s Goodman Studio. The stage is a small platform in the middle of the room, with all the chairs laid out surrounding it. The distance is close and intimate, a proximity which makes the music’s expression much more personal than you’d expect from a professional show you bought a ticket for. They play Béla Bartók’s String Quartet No. 4, 5th Movement, rapid, staccato, aggressive and load. It’s an overwhelming and almost scary sound, that certainly wakes you up after the serenity of the previous act. The next facility is Studio 2, where the performers are all separated, playing from platforms adjoining all the four opposing walls. The audience is all in between, and the strange positioning creates a disorienting feeling of not being able to locate the source of the sound, as if the sound is all around you. The music is Bach’s Die Kunst Der Fuge, Contrapunctus XIV. The speed and quality of the music is comparable to the Haydn, but contains a more melancholy melody. The result was my head spinning and my heart not being sure what emotion to express—that’s not saying it wasn’t impactful. The fourth act is presented in the Theater, but the quartet is nowhere to be seen. They’re apparently hidden away inside the orchestra pit. We’re forced to focus all our attention on the sound itself, no distraction from the visual element of the performers’ movements. The music is Returning Souls by Shih-Hui Chen, and it’s a breath of fresh air in a performance preceded entirely by European composers predating 1950. I am ignorant of music, but in the sound of this there was a more Asian quality that came before, an unpredictability that keeps me on my toes, the use of techniques like plucking and almost dissonant notes. The final act is back in the Concert Hall, and finally the stage is normal, the four musicians in front of us where we can see them. A final grounding that brings us full circle, in a context we normally expect to observe a concert. They play Song Recollections by Lei Liang. There are long, drawn out, uncomfortable points, some raindrop-like plucking sections, and finally a number of joyous, energetic sections, full of feeling. It’s a strong sendoff, and the longest show of all. I’m left a bit lost for words in the end. All manner of experiments and styles, it all pulls me in different directions.