案の定というべきか、最初の曲では弦の音が籠もって何ともお粗末な響き、ストラディヴァリも形無しだ。ところが最後のモリコーネになると、粒立ちも聞こえ明らかに音のバランスが良くなっていた。サウンドエンジニアが手探りで始めて、調整を追い込んだに違いない。つまるところ生の音ではなくPAを加味したコンサートにせざるを得ない規模ということだろう。
演奏者たちはいずれもしっかりとした技術を持っていたが、特にピアノのジ・ヨンが印象に残った。チェロのマイケル・ニコラスも良かった。演目の中ではブラームスのピアノ四重奏1番の出来が良かったと思うが、ヴァイオリンのジャッキーヴにはもう少し濃厚な歌わせ方を出して欲しい気がした。五嶋龍はアンコールに十八番の「庭の千草」の変奏曲をたっぷり時間を掛けて聞かせ、彼なりのサービス精神を発揮していたが、プログラムのヘンデルは音程も甘くて雑に聞こえたのが残念だった。
I went to the concert produced by Ryu Goto today. He introduced Ensemble Ditto’s, a group of young Korean musicians based in New York, but a quartet would not be the right fit in the huge Hall A of Tokyo International Forum.
15 minutes past the supposed opening time, the lighting faded, and it started a commercial of the sponsor company on large video displays in both ends of the stage, and I realized it was actually a pop concert with classical music.
As expected in the first piece, the strings were muffled and the sound was poor even if it was a Stradivari. On the other hand, the final piece, Morricone, turned more sibilant with much improved balance of sonality. I concluded that the sound engineer must have started groping the knobs and gradually managed to finetune the sound as the program progressed. I believe the concert was sound-reinforced to cover the capacity of the hall.
The players were all skillful, and in particular Ji-Yong, the pianist, was impressive. Michael Nicolas, the cellist, was excellent, too. In the program, Brahms Piano Quartet No.1 was the highlight, although I wanted the violin sang the melody more vividly.
As for Ryu Goto, his keys sounded rather loose with Handel unfortunately with less concentration probably, but played his favorite variations from “the Last Rose of Summer” as the long encore, which was his careful effort servicing the audience.
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