Week of Belgian Music, also in Brussels's Jette with the Belgian Taurus Quartet. Music by a Belgian talent cut off in his prime, Guillaume Lekeu and music by an Austrian composer who also died too young, Franz Schubert. All this for a small audience in the stately upper hall of the abbot's residence of the former Dielegem Abbey.
The municipality of Jette is now organizing "Classics in the Abbey" for the 10th time in a row. Admittedly with two corona seasons in between and a season that had to start late this year for the same reason. But no matter, the four members of the Taurus Quartet, who have known each other since 2012, were a guarantee for an impeccable concert. Not with Lekeu's better-known work, the Adagio for string trio and string orchestra, but with a movement from what was later to become a complete string quartet, but was never completed, an "Adagio molto sempre cantante doloroso." It dates from 1887. And with an eerie premonition of a 17-year-old who would die a few years later, he gave it a verse as a subtitle: "Mon âme est triste jusqu' à la mort". He was only 24 when he died in 1894. It is a "Méditation", performed perfectly with that disposition by the Taurus Quartet. Lekeu wrote only about fifty works.
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© Roger Creyf[/caption]
Franz Schubert, on the other hand, composed nearly a thousand works in his also short 31 years of life. Smart of Taurus not to bring 'death and the maiden' once more but a lesser-known work, his last String Quartet no. 15 (D887), dating from two years before his death. It is cellist Martijn Vink who opens it with a couple of low tones, after which the violins take the work to higher regions. In the second part, the themes are unraveled very finely and delicately. Then follows a lively and at times stirring scherzo and a tumultuous allegro. In sound intensity almost Beethoven. Yet it seems to be entirely carried by the cello part. It is a long work, one endless arc of tension, says violinist Liesbeth Baelus, it is almost a symphony, confirms first violin Wietse Beel. But what also makes the concert so good is that the sound is so close to your skin in that beautiful large hall of the former abbot's residence of the former Dielegem Abbey. You are almost in the music. Yet there is one drawback to that hall: and yes, it was stormy rainy weather, but that annoying leak in the ceiling needs to be fixed, especially if you are sitting next to the bucket that has to catch the dripping all too audibly.
WHO: Taurus Quartet with Wietse Beels, violin; Liesbeth Baelus, violin; Vincent Hepp, viola; Martijn Vink, cello.
WHAT: Classics in the Abbey: Guillaume Lekeu, Méditations. Molto adagio, sempre cantante doloroso (1887) Franz Schubert, String Quartet no. 15, D887
WHERE: Dielegem Abbey, Jette
WHEN: February 6, 2022