The Fifth String Quartet of American composer Kenneth Fuchs, which had its world premiere Sunday afternoon at the Colony Hotel in Delray Beach, is an effective piece of dramatic music first and foremost, with a big-boned grandeur that shares sonic space with an intense and hearfelt elegy.

Fuchs, a professor of composition at the University of Connecticut, grew up in Fort Lauderdale and wrote the work at the behest of the Delray String Quartet, which gave the premiere and will play it again Friday night and Sunday afternoon. The composer said in remarks to an appreciative house last Sunday that the quartet, subtitled American, is a reflection on his country in the post 9-11 era.

Formally, the quartet is laid out in four movements, the outer two essentially in A major and the middle two in the neighborhood of D minor, all with traditional attributes such as sonata-allegro form, a scherzo and a double fugue. Its language is tonal, occasionally minimalist, and highly accessible, with a blue-skies feeling to much of it that derives from Fuchs' extensive use of counterpoint and individual lines.

All of the material in the quartet is derived from the opening theme, a long-breathed, slow, Coplandesque canon that starts with the first violin and continues down to the cello. It's one of those themes that promises a lot, and its derivations later in the quartet were clear to discern, again because the solo-line texture Fuchs sets up at the beginning accustoms the ear to single them out. The Delrays played this opening, which is marked for a very slow tempo, much too quickly to make the proper transitional effect from its stateliness to the exuberance of the rest of the movement. Nonetheless, it was pretty and evocative, and was played with an admirable level of commitment.

The first movement sets a difficult challenge for the foursome, dominated as it is by a bustling variation of the theme that requires an athletic bow and precise intonation at a high rate of speed. The effect is one of great optimism and energy, and exciting to hear. Each member attacked the assignment with gusto, building up a big cathedral of sound before the music darkened and set the stage for the scherzo.

The second movement, an agitated Shostakovich-style march, turns into a movement of almost constant motion, with long passages of pizzicati and fast-stepping motifs played in unison by all four members. Early on, the viola plays a dark-hued melody derived from the theme over a nervous pizzicato in the cello that ends up extending for pages; violist Richard Fleischman and cellist Claudio Jaffé played this beautifully, giving it a strong sense of dark energy. This is a powerful, propulsive movement, and it got a fine performance from the quartet.

The third, marked Elegia, again hints at Shostakovich by starting (after a minor-key version of the opening) with a sad-carousel waltz theme in the second violin's upper registers that gets taken up by the whole ensemble and ultimately turns into an aggressive, sardonic version of itself before what may be the elegy itself appears toward the end of the movement. This section also received a fine performance, though the very first bars could have been a good bit slower, more mysterious, to make a clearer contrast with the second movement.

And the music of the movement is cut from much of the same cloth as the second, which also made the two middle movements sound almost like one continuous piece. Perhaps if the second movement were played more drily, the differences would stand out better. Also, the elegy at the end, which received an intensely emotional performance, could perhaps be a little longer, especially as the movement itself is designed to be the heart of the work.

The finale returns to the open-prairie feeling of the first, with a fugue subject as close to a fiddle breakdown as it could get, and when all four instruments took their turn at it, the effect was joyful and confident. The last movement doesn't introduce much distinctive new material, but it serves as a welcome return to the cheerfulness of the first pages. This also provided the quartet's members with a major workout, and they pulled it off admirably.

The Colony audience applauded the piece vociferously, and there is no doubt about its ability to engage listeners. Kenneth Fuchs has written a fine piece of music in this quartet, one that could conceivably fill the new-music inclinations of American string quartet concerts in an absorbing way. It also seems to me that the last two movements could be rescored for string orchestra (call it Elegy and Fugue) and make a most attractive contemporary piece for chamber orchestras.

The Delrays will record this quartet later this month for an all-Fuchs disc on Naxos, and one looks forward to hearing the piece again, as well as to celebrating the composer's achievement and the progress made by this homegrown string foursome.

The Delray String Quartet will repeat this program at 8 p.m. Friday night at All Saints Episcopal Church in Fort Lauderdale, and again at 4 p.m. Sunday at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Coconut Grove. Tickets are $20. Call 213-4138 or visit www.delraystringquartet.org.

Delray String Quartet (Dec. 11, Colony Hotel, Delray Beach): This foursome is on something of a roll as it enters its eighth season of concertizing. Next month it will give the world premiere of the String Quartet No. 5 by Kenneth Fuchs, and will contribute that work to an all-Fuchs disc for Naxos.

It's just released a second disc (a sampler of live performances from last season), and at the end of next year plans to offer a recording of the Grieg String Quartet and the Piano Quintet of Jean Sibelius, with pianist Tao Lin.

And with a new sponsorship from the Akerman Senterfitt law firm, the quartet is on the verge of a more muscular future. Last Sunday afternoon, it gave the last performance of its first program in a well-attended concert at the Colony Hotel in Delray Beach.

The guest for the afternoon was clarinetist Paul Green, who played the Clarinet Quintet (in B-flat, Op. 34) of Carl Maria von Weber. Clarinetists would be considerably worse off without Weber's works for clarinet, and this piece is essentially a chamber concerto, with the strings mostly playing accompaniment as the clarinet leaps athletically over the soundscape.

Green played with alacrity and fluid technique, with plenty of impressive, pearly runs throughout the range of the instrument. The very top of the register was sometimes pinched and shrill, but he made up for that with a big, pretty tone in the slow movement.

The second half was devoted to the String Quartet No. 1 (in E minor) of Bedrich Smetana, titled From My Life. This is a repeat work for the Delrays, and this season it got a very well-drilled, solid performance, with good work from violist Richard Fleischman to get the piece off to an impassioned start. Cellist Claudio Jaffe played his yearning intro to the slow movement beautifully, and violinists Mei Mei Luo and Tomas Cotik played with force and vigor.

Although this was an impressive, accurate reading of this fine work of late Romanticism, overall it was perhaps played too aggressively. Each movement was hammered home, and though there were lovely spots of tenderness and contrast in moments such as the rustic Trio of the second movement, in general things were hard-edged and ferocious; it was effective and exciting, but rather too rough.

The concert closed with a very effective arrangement (by a Briton who goes by J. Nurse) of the overture to Franz Lehar's The Merry Widow. It was strong enough to implant Vilja in one's head for hours afterward, and it was a certified crowd pleaser Sunday.

It may be that this lineup of the quartet, with Cotik in his second season, will be the one to carry it to the next level. The group seems to have gotten past some of its earlier bumpiness and is starting to think of itself as an ensemble that can do bigger things than heretofore. This will be the season to watch for fans of the Delray String Quartet.

The Delray String Quartet has been adding luster to the South Florida music scene now for seven seasons. Second violinist Tomas Cotik, new to the group this season, has quickly become integrated into the ensemble, which has developed a following across three counties.

The Delray Quartet opened the new year Sunday afternoon at its home base at the Colony Hotel in Delray Beach with a program featuring three composers.

The concert led off with Beethoven's Quartet in B-flat, Op. 18, No. 6. The last of his published early quartets, the work is less knotty than his late works in the genre, with a clear structure, easily discernible melodies, and a style that descends directly from Haydn and Mozart.

Beethoven's quartet was given a strong, vigorous performance, underlined by a live and unforgiving acoustic that magnified a few scrapes and blemishes. The music was largely well served, particularly La Malinconia, the Adagio opening to the last movement. Although the tragic mood is quickly dispersed in favor of a faster tempo and cheerier mood, Beethoven's written request that the opening "be played with the utmost delicacy" was affectingly observed by the Delray musicians. With the doors to the room in the lobby left open, passing trucks lent their own percussive coloration to the listening experience.

At about 12 minutes, Shostakovich's String Quartet No. 7 in F minor is the shortest of his essays in the form. Written in 1960 in memory of his first wife, it shows the composer withdrawing into himself and embracing an even more introspective style. Each instrument is afforded solo possibilities, often playing alone, unaccompanied and unadorned. The piece eventually erupts into an angry and ferocious fugue, which confirmed in glorious fashion the skills of each Delray member, with the players ripping into the music with savage abandon. The final retreat into quiet resignation was sensitively accomplished.

Anton Arensky was a student of Rimsky-Korsakov, but found himself influenced to a greater degree by his friend, Tchaikovsky. Arensky's String Quartet No. 2, Op. 35a, was originally written for violin, viola, and two cellos, and revised for standard string quartet forces, the version that was performed Sunday.

In the first movement, Arensky drew his theme from the Greek Orthodox liturgy, and the last movement uses the famous Slava theme also employed by Beethoven in the second of his Rasoumovsky Quartets, and by Mussorgsky in his opera Boris Godunov.

The middle movement, a set of variations on a Tchaikovsky theme, became Arensky's best known work in his later arrangement for string orchestra. Few would be able to identify Tchaikovsky's theme, however, since it is taken from one of his most obscure works, the song Legend–The Christ Child Had a Garden from his Sixteen Songs for Children.

The heavy borrowings apart, the music made for a stirring experience in the hands of the Delray musicians, with the rich instrumental tones of violist Richard Fleischman and cellist Claudio Jaffe particularly sumptuous.

The program will be repeated Jan. 9 at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church, Coconut Grove; Jan. 14 at All Saints Episcopal Church in Fort Lauderdale; and Jan 16 at Trinity by the Cove Episcopal Church in Naples. delraystringquartet.com; 561-213-4128.

Not every composer wrote string quartets with four more-or-less equal voices.

The earliest quartets, and the quartets of later writers such as Gaetano Donizetti, can often be a workout for the first violin, with the other three instruments playing backup. But much of the canonical repertoire requires all four of the players to be equally able, and the foursome that doesn't have a deep bench finds musical life to be a struggle.

So it's a pleasure to report that the new second violinist of the Delray String Quartet, Tomas Cotik, makes a fine addition to this ambitious group, which opened its seventh season Dec. 3 with a concert at All Saints Episcopal Church in Delray Beach.

Cotik, an Argentinian-born musician who has recently taken a teaching assistantship at the University of Miami, replaces Megan McClendon, a one-season replacement for Laszlo Pap, a founding member of the quartet. Pap now leads the Fort Lauderdale String Quartet, which is under the auspices of the Symphony of the Americas.

Cotik also has a strong and distinctive sound, and in most of the concert he and violist Richard Fleischman supplied a vivid, virile middle to the music, with solo work from both men making full impact. This first concert of the season had two major events, the first being the performance of the String Quartet No. 4 of the American composer Kenneth Fuchs.

Fuchs, a Broward County native who studied at the University of Miami before moving on to Juilliard, was on hand to discuss his brief but engaging one-movement quartet, subtitled Bergonzi, in honor of the UM-based quartet for whom it was written. It's a relatively light but tautly constructed piece built on a three-note rising motif first sounded by the viola. That trades off with a gentler three-note motif introduced by the cello, and the music soon expands into a busy, energetic sonic tableau, music that sounds very open and very American.

In the middle, the cello motif is transformed into a moody, expectant theme over a pizzicato version of the three-note opening material; in the last section, the feeling of purposeful energy resumes. It is a fine piece of music, and the Delray played it well, though with a certain tightness and tension that sounded at times as though the players were somewhat too concerned with precision.

Despite its speedy tempo and offbeat accents, this is essentially positive, forthright music, and it would have benefited from a greater sense of relaxation and ease. Still, it was impressive that the Delray began its season with a piece of recent contemporary American music, which to my mind is the logical core repertory for this quartet.

The Second Quartet of Johannes Brahms (in A minor, Op. 51, No. 2), which closed the concert, is one of his most familiar pieces of chamber music, and the Delray gave its rolling first movement a sound that was well-balanced and elegant. The short ritardando transition passages, though, slowed things down a little too much, which hurt the narrative momentum.

First violinist Mei-Mei Luo offered a lovely reading of the main theme of the slow second movement, and the quartet handled the dramatic contrasting section capably. The third movement also was a bit on the slow side for my taste, though I've heard other performances at about that speed. But it lacks lift at this pace, and the expectation-and-mystery tradeoff here sounded tentative rather than deliberate. The Allegro vivace was quite good, though, from the standpoint of pace, technical accomplishment and ensemble.

The finale clipped along smartly, and the players attacked the music with considerable force and excitement. The transition to the A major section toward the end was beautifully done, with some fine playing by cellist Claudio Jaffe. Overall, while some of the music was too cautiously approached, this was a strong performance of this repertoire staple, and another important stage in this quartet's development.

Transportation problems had me arriving late at the concert,‭ ‬so I missed all but the last movement of the opening piece,‭ ‬the‭ ‬Bird Quartet‭ (‬in C,‭ ‬Hob III:‭ ‬39‭) ‬of Haydn.‭ ‬The finale had good ensemble and a snaky kind of energy that was more forceful than the usual powdered-wig approach,‭ ‬and‭ ‬it worked well.

For an encore,‭ ‬the quartet played Fleischman‭'‬s arrangement of‭ ‬a piece called‭ ‬Melody,‭ ‬by the Argentine composer Astor Piazzolla.‭ ‬The Delray played it with the requisite high emotion for an effective interpretation of this composer‭'‬s music. – G.‭ ‬Stepanich

The Delray String Quartet opened its seventh season Friday in Fort Lauderdale with a new second violinist and a much tighter, richer ensemble sound.

The second violin chair had been a center of instability for the quartet, just as the group was expanding from its Delray Beach base to Broward and Miami-Dade counties. Longtime member Lazslo Pap resigned early this year. He was replaced last season by Megan McClendon, who has now been replaced by the young Argentine violinist Tomas Cotik.

Cotik, a former member of the New World Symphony and a teaching assistant and doctoral student at the University of Miami's Frost School of Music, made his debut with the quartet at Friday's concert at All Saints Episcopal Church. While it's unclear whether Cotik's presence was the reason, the quartet—always one of the brighter stars on the local music scene—played with greater authority, cohesiveness and consistency than in the past.

Haydn's Quartet in C major, Op. 33, No. 3, The Bird came off with remarkably clean but never overly polite playing. The minor-key section in the first movement was pensive and brooding. The Scherzo had just the right touch of humor, and the Adagio inspired the quartet to darkly dramatic playing, with intense performances by first violinist Mei Mei Luo and cellist Claudio Jaffé. The last movement brought more crisp playing, with just enough bite.

The American composer Kenneth Fuchs, currently professor of composition at the University of Connecticut, attended the concert to introduce his String Quartet No. 4. Fuchs, a South Florida native who studied at Juilliard with David Diamond, Milton Babbitt and Vincent Persichetti, composed the work in 1998 on a commission from the University of Miami's Frost School of Music for its resident Bergonzi String Quartet.

"As a composer I want my music to be very direct and accessible," he told the audience before the performance. "I don't want it to be overtly pretty, but I think communication is very important."

The one-movement, 11-minute work had an energetic, optimistic American sound, with open harmonies reminiscent of Aaron Copland and melodies that were soaring and lyrical without being cloying. It opened with repeated, minimalist figures in the viola, gained in force as the other instruments came in and used harmonics in the violins to achieve ghostly, wispy effects. After building to an impassioned, melodic climax, the pace picked up quickly and the work surged toward a swift and abrupt but effective ending.

The concert concluded with the Brahms Quartet in A Minor, Op. 51, No. 2. If the performance lacked the relaxed Viennese feeling that much of the music seemed to call for—as in the second theme of the first movement—it was an intensely focused and tonally rich account. The quartet achieved an almost symphonic depth of tone in the agitated, tremolo section of the second movement. The last movement came off with ferocious bite, but with a measured pace that allowed the drama to come through.

As an encore, in honor of the new violinist's roots in Argentina, the quartet played a transcription of Melody by Astor Piazzolla, a smoky, romantic few minutes played with warm sensuality.

The Delray String Quartet repeats the program 4 p.m. Sunday at The Colony Hotel and Cabaña Club, Delray Beach; and 4 p.m. Dec. 12 at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church, Coconut Grove.

The Delray String Quartet that finished its‭ ‬sixth season‭ ‬this past weekend at the Colony Hotel in its namesake‭'‬s historic downtown‭ ‬is a foursome that has been playing together more frequently than its earlier iterations,‭ ‬thanks to its expanded three-county performance schedule.

And the extra‭ ‬time together showed Sunday,‭ ‬with excellent performances of‭ ‬quartets by Arriaga and Tchaikovsky that were fully in the spirit and style of their very‭ ‬different composers.‭ ‬As a bonus,‭ ‬the quartet listed its programs for the‭ ‬upcoming‭ ‬seventh season,‭ ‬and it is a good series,‭ ‬with rarities,‭ ‬American works and core Germanic‭ ‬classics that make up concerts truly worth looking forward to.

Sunday‭'‬s program‭ ‬opened‭ ‬with the Quartet No.‭ ‬2‭ (‬in A‭) ‬of the sadly short-lived Spanish composer Juan Arriaga,‭ ‬"the Spanish Mozart,‭"‬ who died‭ ‬10‭ ‬days‭ ‬shy of his‭ ‬20th birthday.‭ ‬Arriaga was without doubt a major talent,‭ ‬and this quartet,‭ ‬one of three the teenage composer finished,‭ ‬offers a‭ ‬telling‭ ‬demonstration‭ ‬of the potential that was lost when he died.

This is a sunny,‭ ‬inventive,‭ ‬vigorous‭ ‬piece,‭ ‬and the Delray played it that way.‭ ‬The first movement chugged along in good Haydnesque fashion,‭ ‬with an admirable balance between motifs and accompaniments.‭ ‬In the opening section,‭ ‬for instance,‭ ‬second‭ ‬violinist Megan McClendon and violist Richard Fleischman kept the repeated chord figures delicate but persistent,‭ ‬setting an ideal backdrop for the first violinist Mei-Mei Luo‭'‬s playing of the main theme,‭ ‬and cellist Claudio Jaffé‭'‬s‭ ‬reading of the‭ ‬precisely etched‭ ‬falling figure‭ ‬that‭ ‬answered it.‭

The theme-and-variations second‭ ‬movement‭ ‬offered‭ ‬a good,‭ ‬well-played variety of styles,‭ ‬from the‭ ‬first violin‭'‬s‭ ‬florid elaboration‭ ‬of‭ ‬the theme in the first variation and the‭ ‬sparkle of McClendon and Jaffé‭'‬s leaping figures in the second,‭ ‬to the somber‭ ‬beauty of the minor-key variation,‭ ‬soulfully‭ ‬played by Fleischman,‭ ‬and‭ ‬the‭ ‬charm of the all-pizzicato‭ ‬fourth‭ ‬variation‭ ‬that followed.‭

The group gave the trio‭ ‬section‭ ‬of the third-movement‭ ‬minuet‭ ‬an almost Beethovenian sense of expectant‭ ‬stasis,‭ ‬which‭ ‬helped create maximum contrast for‭ ‬the‭ ‬headlong joy of the finale‭; ‬the Delray played it closing pages particularly well,‭ ‬with a substantial head of steam before heading into the big arpeggio gesture of the last bars.

The‭ ‬second‭ ‬half of the concert was devoted to the String Quartet No.‭ ‬1‭ (‬in D,‭ ‬Op.‭ ‬11‭) ‬of Tchaikovsky,‭ ‬one of the‭ ‬most‭ ‬popular‭ ‬of all quartets.‭ ‬Here,‭ ‬too,‭ ‬the Delray entered entirely into the world of this work,‭ ‬which is so suffused with indelible melody and effective instrumental color.

Of particular‭ ‬note was the well-known‭ ‬Andante cantabile second movement,‭ ‬whose secondary theme is so treacherous for the first violin in that it‭'‬s‭ ‬very plain,‭ ‬but it‭'‬s‭ ‬in a tough key and it‭'‬s completely exposed over the‭ ‬gentlest of accompaniments.‭ ‬This has often been a place for tuning to go awry,‭ ‬but on Sunday,‭ ‬Luo handled it with‭ ‬accuracy and elegance,‭ ‬so much so that the composer‭'‬s transition back to the main theme sounded logical rather‭ ‬than forced.

The Scherzo movement,‭ ‬essentially a folk dance,‭ ‬was played with strong,‭ ‬but not too strong,‭ ‬offbeat accents,‭ ‬and the closing movement had‭ ‬plenty‭ ‬of fire after the light,‭ ‬almost offhand‭ ‬interpretation‭ ‬of the opening bars.‭ ‬Jaffé was especially good in‭ ‬the beauty of his upper-register playing in‭ ‬the movement‭'‬s secondary folk tune,‭ ‬toward the end.

The Tchaikovsky received rapturous applause,‭ ‬and‭ ‬as an encore,‭ ‬the Delrays played a William Zinn arrangement of a rag by Scott Joplin:‭ ‬Country Club,‭ ‬published in‭ ‬1909.‭ ‬It was a‭ ‬charming‭ ‬piece,‭ ‬ably performed,‭ ‬and‭ ‬it made‭ ‬a smile-inducing end to‭ ‬what has been a watershed season for this Palm Beach County ensemble.

***

Five programs are on the schedule for the Delray‭'‬s seventh season,‭ ‬which again will feature performances in Miami-Dade and Broward‭ ‬counties as well as the Colony.‭ ‬Two American works‭ ‬--‭ ‬the Fourth Quartet of Kenneth Fuchs‭ ‬(in December‭) ‬and the Second Quartet of Randall Thompson‭ ‬(in March‭) ‬– are planned along with rarities such as the Piano Quintet of Jean Sibelius‭ (‬in March‭)‬,‭ ‬which will feature pianist Tao Lin.‭ ‬Canonical works by Haydn‭ (‬No.‭ ‬32‭ ‬in C,‭ ‬The Bird‭)‬,‭ ‬Beethoven‭ (‬No.‭ ‬6‭ ‬in B-flat,‭ ‬Op.‭ ‬18,‭ ‬No.‭ ‬6‭)‬,‭ ‬Brahms‭ (‬No.‭ ‬2‭ ‬in A minor,‭ ‬Op.‭ ‬51,‭ ‬No.‭ ‬2‭) ‬and Schumann‭ (‬No.‭ ‬3‭ ‬in A,‭ ‬Op.‭ ‬41,‭ ‬No.‭ ‬3‭)‬ also are scheduled,‭ ‬along with works by Shostakovich‭ (‬No.‭ ‬7‭ ‬in‭ ‬F-sharp minor,‭ ‬Op.‭ ‬108‭) ‬and Tchaikovsky‭ ( ‬No.‭ ‬2‭ ‬in F,‭ ‬Op.‭ ‬22‭)‬.‭ ‬For more‭ ‬information,‭ ‬call‭ ‬213-4138‭ ‬or visit www.delraystringquartet.com.‭