An Evening with Signum Quartett

What can be the best way to relax after a hard week at work? For me its... of course Music! And when its Mozart played live.. nothing can beat it. It gets even better when you get a free ticket (Courtesy: Arun\Geojit Financial Services) to such rare events in Chennai. Chennai is celebrating the 250th birth anniversary of Mozart and I think this is the second live event this year. I'm glad I have witnessed both of them.. (first one happened at Museum Theatre in August).

The second event was a part of November Fest organised by Friday Review, THE HINDU at Music Academy. Signum Quartett, from Germany, came all the way to Chennai to recreate the magic of Mozart on the second day of this Fest. The 4 member group consists of Kerstin Dill (Violin) Annette Walther (Violin) Valentin Eichler (Viola) and Thomas Schmitz (Cello). The group played the String Quartet in F major (K 168) and String Quartet in D minor (K 421), during the first half. Then there was a 15 interval where people visted the stalls of the sponsors of the show... highlight was Kingfisher airlines. That was when I happen to spot some of the prominent figures in tamil music industry like Sreenivas, Anuradha and Sriram, Chinmayee and many classical singers. The final part of the show was the String Quartet in C major (K 465) popularly known as "Dissonance". Its said the final piece is perhaps the most famous and critically acclaimed of all Mozart's string quartets. Its extraordinary opening proves Mozart's a genius. The show didn't without an Encore !!

Its not the number of instruments used for a composition but the way the instrument is played that makes good music. It had me wondering that just three intruments had kept the audience alive for nearly 90 min. There was a standing ovation for the performers at the end of the show. Well they sure deserved it. Adding to the flavour of the event was P.C. Ramakrishna who was the emcee. Well for people who had been to the previous Mozart show at Museum Theatre it was like hearing him repeat the same words/examples to describe Mozart's brillainace!