Unitarian Church, Dublin
Sam Perkin – String Quartet
Lera Auerbach – String Quartet No 3 Schubert – String Quartet No 15 in G, D887
In Dublin, and in Cork last Thursday, the RTÉ Vanbrugh was giving the first performances of a first string quartet by the young Cork-born composer Sam Perkin.
Perkin, who graduated last year with a BMus, is well-established in CIT's Cork School of Music whose ensembles – the Symphony Orchestra, the Jazz Big Band and the Mozart Players – have premiered his pieces.
Writing for traditional forces has since led him to the string quartet and to an important opportunity with one of the RTÉ Performing Groups. It was also a chance to be heard in Dublin where the performance was recorded for later broadcast by RTÉ Lyric FM.
The piece is easy to listen to and well crafted in a style traditional to the genre. Perkin handles the four voices well although without fully overcoming a sense of someone playing with new toys. He avoids extreme, avant-garde techniques and in his notes speaks of influences – my guess is that he admires the Ravel Quartet.
The Vanbrugh closed with Schubert's last Quartet – No. 15 in G – but brought a fresher intensity and engagement to the insightfully text-based Quartet No. 3 by Russian poet and composer Lera Auerbach (b. 1973).
