Villiers Quartet, Stokesley Methodist Church

A NEAR-CAPACITY audience greeted the Villiers Quartet for the final concert in the current Teesside Music Society series.

Frank Harrison, introducing the programme and welcoming the quartet, thanked the audience for its loyalty and support in his first term as chairman following the death of the much loved and respected Nat Smith, to whom the season was dedicated.

The quartet is a spectacularly gifted group of instrumentalists – and so young – comprising violinists James Dickinson and Tamaki Higashi, Carmen Flores on viola and on this occasion, Benjamin Hughes, cello.

Hughes stood in for Nick Stringfellow, but is a much accredited instrumentalist, among other things being principal cellist of the BBC Concert Orchestra.

The quartet will be heard later this year in the BBC drama Lady Chatterley’s Lover.

The concert began with Beethoven’s Quartet in B flat major, Op.18 no. 6, a thing of breathtaking beauty, written when Beethoven was 28.

This performance established the standard which the quartet attains. The lively opening, in which the players toss the themes to one another, pursuing each other, lively and stately by turns, is a wonderful showcase for strings.

Dickenson, first violin, could almost be taken for a youthful Beethoven himself, with his curly head and spectacles.

Riho Esko Maimets, a modern Estonian composer took the mood to new areas with his Sanctus for String Quartet, drawing on a range of material from religious traditions. Particularly impressive and deeply moving was the effect achieved by the cello in the Misterioso, as of a soft sighing wind, almost just a breath. It was spellbinding.

Delius’s Late Swallows from the Quartet in E minor is another lovely thing, conjuring for the composer, now blind, memories of his home.

Mendelssohn’s Quartet No. 2 in A minor, Op 13, brought the concert to an impressive close, perfecting an experience I think will prove unforgettable for those who had the privilege of hearing this performance by a truly great quartet.

Irene MacDonald