Bergamot Quartet: In the Brink

This excellent debut puts the Bergamot right into the mix of our most exciting string quartets with four debut recordings. While Paul Wiancko's bustling Ode On A Broken Loom (2019) and Suzanne Ferrin's wobbly Undecim (2006) are both captivating, it's the works by Tania León and Ledah Finck (also the group's violinist) that kick their repertoire into the next level. León's Esencia (2009) is jam-packed with expertly deployed rhythms from Caribbean and Latin American traditions, both a warm embrace of her roots and a dazzling display of compositional acuity. Finck's title track (2019) takes things to a continent of her own imaginings, adding a drum set (Terry Sweeney) and shouted vocals by the quartet for a wild, spiky ride. My radar is firmly set for more, both from the Bergamot and Finck.

— Jeremy Shatan, 1.02.2023

The debut album from Ledah Finck (violin), Sarah Thomas (violin), Amy Tan (viola) and Iréne Han (cello), as Bergamot Quartet they bring their strings to the works of Suzanne Farrin, Tania León, Paul Wiancko, and Ledah Finck with much chamber appeal from their very capable hands.

Wiancko’s Ode On A Broken Loom starts the listen with the swift and dynamic strings flowing with much grace, as a rich and subtly melodic landscape unfolds, and Leon’s Esencia follows with plenty of culture populating the adventurous interaction that highlights the rhythmic gestures.

Undecim, by Farrin, lands on the back half, and is a darker moment, where strategic bowing and a distinct harmonic vision make for a mysterious execution, and Finck’s In The Brink exits the listen with both busy and sparse moments that illuminate the unpredictable vocalizations, angular bouts and sonic vision that takes company from Terry Sweeney’s drums.

A truly exceptional first record that spotlights living composers, Bergamot Quartet make for a very accomplished and exciting chamber listening experience.

— Tom Haugen, 10.24.2022

This is the debut recording of the all-woman Bergamot Quartet, a group dedicated to discovering and playing new music. Well, gee, there’s a novel concept in the classical world, even here in the 21st century, where 95% of string quartets have the bulk of their repertoire taken up by the old-timey pieces!

We start out with Paul Wiancko’s Ode on a Broken Loom, written in 2019 on a commission from the Eybler Quartet. It opens with fast-paced, polyphonic, bitonal music that introduces the piece to us. The development is interesting but, to my ears, a bit too long before moving on to the second theme, but it then gets more interesting, including a section in which Wiancko writes for the strings in such a way that they almost sound like a tape playing backwards; then, a bit later, a section where the quartet almost sounds like an organ or a hurdy-gurdy. Weird, but very interesting! The music accelerates near the end for the finish: exciting but, I thought, just a shade formulaic.

Next up is Tania León’s Essencia, written in 2009 on a grant from the Fromm Music Foundation. (Sometimes you really do wonder if modern-day composers write anything without grants or commissions. Hell, if Brahms, Mahler, Debussy or Stravinsky did that, we wouldn’t have had most of their music!) This one is highly rhythmic, using Latino music as an inspiration but, except for the rhythms, sounding much more bitonal and, at times, even atonal. The first movement is largely a moto perpetuo except for a slower, more relaxed section in the middle, and this is some of the most creative music presented here, with odd little note flurries scattered around and even a microtonal slide upward by the full quartet playing in unison. The second movement is much more rhythmically complex, often pitting two contrasting rhythms against one another with brief slower interludes of a more lyrical nature. Here, León, too, uses microtonal slides, but also contrasting rhythms, some of an asymmetrical nature, This is a VERY interesting piece. The third and last movement, using asymmetric rhythms at a faster pace, also takes the time to explore a lyrical theme here and here. I found this piece to be interesting but a bit too formulaic. It got stuck in ruts a bit too long here and there for me.

I found Undecim, written by Suzanne Farrin in 2006, to be a much more innovative work in every way. Here, Farrin juxtaposes contrasting, even conflicting, themes to create a fascinating mosaic that somehow jells together. Her lines notes discuss the fact that “Memories are partial, incomplete and fragmented,” but of course it is the music, its quality and its emotional and intellectual impact that counts, and I believe that she has written a truly interesting work that deserves more performances (and yes, even more recordings, good as this one is). I was caught up in the way she introduces and manipulates her themes and theme fragments, and I think you will be, too. Absolutely nothing in this piece is formulaic or predictable.

We end with In the Brink (2019) by the Bergamot Quartet’s lead violinist, Ledah Finck. This, too is a fascinating, multi-faceted work which includes some speak-singing by the quartet members to fragmented words (“where are we are you? Am I you we I’m terribly afraid of becoming lost”). The words, I thought, were superfluous and distracting to the music, which was far more interesting. The second movement, strangely enough, includes a drum solo, during which the quartet plays very little but shouts a lot. Oddly, the acoustic for this piece is entirely different from the rest of the album. The microphone placement is very close and the sound is rather boxy. Perhaps this was an artistic choice; I don’t know. The third movement consisted of sounds made, I think, by the quartet members pulling on the strings of their instruments before actually bowing them in rapid, overlapping figures. This then leads to fast, rising figures played by the two violins with drum and cymbal accompaniment until they disappear into the violin stratosphere; the last movement opens with viola and cello playing a more lyrical theme, but then devolves into an almost silent passage with a few “crinkly” sounds in it, followed in turn by a syncopated passage featuring bows being struck against the sides of their instruments, light snare drum, and handclapping. You certainly can’t say that they aren’t adventurous. They also sing about how they hold each other in the brink “of all our questions,” thus the title of this CD.

An interesting debut disc, then, with some very interesting pieces on it and a few not so interesting. But at least they’re not afraid to take chances!

— Lynn René Bayley, 5.07.2022

In the Brink, the Bergamot Quartet's debut album, showcases premiere recordings of four works for string quartet. The album features music by mid-career composers Paul Wiancko, Tania León, and Suzanne Farrin, as well as the titular, four-part work, "In the Brink", by violinist/composer Ledah Finck, a co-founder of the quartet. The ensemble makes a solid attempt to introduce new music into the string quartet's contemporary canon (listen to the album here).

Wiancko's Ode on a Broken Loom launches off the album with musical narrative of densely weaving threads. Bergamot gets a chance to show off their technical chops and impeccable sense of rhythm, allowing Wiancko's tightly imitative gestures to be as effective as they can be. The music itself comprises of engaging material organized into three distinct motivic sections. By the end of the piece, the quartet quickly reprises each theme in a stereotypical flashy ending. The form, while traditional and basic, leads the audience through the work and creates an easy listening for an otherwise crowded soundworld. However, this is telling of a larger trend in Wiancko's music, which is that it straddles the line between complexity and popular post-minimalism, often in a manner which distracts from both rather than serving either one.

The three-movement work, Esencia, explores Caribbean and Latin American music of León's background. All three movements are filled with lyrical melodies and contrasting rhythmic sections, standard in all of León's work. Bergamot again gets a chance to show off their strength of ensemble blend and rhythmic integrity, aspects ever rarer to find in a string ensemble. Despite the performance, the work simply comes across as a piece which is more entertaining for the performers than the audience. León's traditional harmonic and rhythmic world, while beautiful in short bursts, seldom varies or expands into anything exceptional.

Undecim, by New York composer Suzanne Farrin, is the true gem on the album. I, for one, am incredibly grateful to Bergamot for promoting Farrin and her music, as I was completely unfamiliar with her prior to their album release. Undecim is comprised of ten sections presented together in one movement. The work alternates between full ensemble and solo sections, allowing all four individuals to have their own time in the limelight. Farrin uses the piece to explore the concept of memory, specifically within the context of the vast classical canon of string quartet repertoire. The music, while inspired by the idea of previous repertoire, makes no attempt at a poor emulation or mockery, and in fact creates an engaging work, climaxing with the buzz of piercing harmonics.

The Bergamot Quartet is joined by percussionist Terry Sweeney on drumset for the final work on the album, Finck's In the Brink. Finck proves herself as both a composer and performer on the album, creating an emotional four-part work using the quartet, drumset, and the ensemble members' voices. In the Brink starts off with a post-minimalist sound which continuously expands into an exploration of the human experience with intricately scored extended techniques. Certain sections of the music, especially in the first two movements, would benefit from either more fluid transitions or just longer amounts of time spent on one idea, so that it can be fully explored before simply moving on to the next one.

The most aurally striking aspect of listening to the entire album is the awkward change when listening to Finck's In the Brink. It is recorded and mixed by someone different than the first three pieces, and the contrast in recording quality and sound is strikingly off-putting. It is disappointing because it does the music a serious disservice, especially when compared to album's earlier tracks.

All in all, the Bergamot Quartet's debut album successfully presents premiere recordings of new works by their group of top-notch performers. While not all the pieces are equally captivating, Bergamot still creates music with extreme technical skill and intense dedication to the support of new music.

The four world première recordings by the Bergamot Quartet on a New Focus Recordings CD are also likely to appeal only to a specialized audience, even though three of the four use the highly familiar instrumental ensemble of a string quartet. Ledah Finck’s four-movement In the Brink goes a step beyond strings by including a drum set (played by Terry Sweeney) and a variety of vocalizations – elements often employed in contemporary music, especially in works that, like this one, are intended to reflect societal troubles and fragmentation. The second movement, “Flood of Ashes,” takes the societal commentary furthest and uses the drum set most intensely, while the third, “Human Nature,” opens with the sound of eructations and squeaking doors and is exactly the sort of presentation that seeks to draw attention to how up-to-date its sensibilities are. The other pieces on the disc have their own avant-garde approaches. Paul Wiancko’s Ode on a Broken Loom has some effective string writing and a comprehensible form (the initial intensity returns at the end), although it seems more an exercise in performance technique than a communicative piece. The three-movement Esencia by Tania León includes “Agua de Florida,” which mixes intense and laid-back elements; “Agua de Rosas,” which contrasts higher and lower string sounds, pizzicato and legato elements; and “Agua de Manantial,” which tosses out various melodic fragments and allows some brief expressiveness in the middle of the proceedings. Exactly what all this is the “essence” of is never quite clear, but the rhythms and textures are often interestingly interwoven. The shortest work on the disc, Suzanne Farrin’s Undecim, is mostly gestural, contrasting high and low notes, runs and static notes, chords and single notes – it explores string capabilities but does not really take the audience anywhere. This (+++) CD is quite well-played by the ensemble, but like many discs consisting entirely of newly composed music (often with an advocacy component), this one seems designed for a small group of committed cognoscenti who will embrace the sound and approach without expecting a wider set of listeners to become engaged with the music – and without much caring whether other people do or not.

In which we find string quartet music taking a well measured leap in to the future with a set of premiere pieces that respect the tradition while expanding the future. A progressive set that’s not so cutting edge that it alienates the old timers, this is how to be ground breaking in a very good way. Solid and skillful, this is the classical music of the future.

— Chris Spector, 6.01.2022