Mendelssohn Perspectives

Aug 4, 12:11 AM

Monday at Music@Menlo paid homage to two distinguished musical luminaries. At the noontime Cafė Conversation, Encounter leader Ara Guzelimian and artistic directors David Finckel and Wu Han discussed “The Legacy of Isaac Stern,” offering anecdotes and inspirations from their experiences teaching alongside the great violinist and pedagogue. In the evening, the limelight turned to the season honoree, Felix Mendelssohn. Following the International Program artists’ captivating Prelude Performance came “Mendelssohn Perspectives”: the festival season’s fourth concert program cast an arresting assemblage of chamber works around three of Mendelssohn’s signature Songs without Words, given poetic voice by pianist Gilbert Kalish. The program ended with a sensational reading of Brahms’s Opus 26 Piano Quartet, featuring the Music@Menlo debut of violinist Yehonatan Berick.

The festival’s series of free daytime events continues on Tuesday, as the Pacifica Quartet, while preparing for Friday night’s performance of Mendelssohn’s final quartets, leads the noontime master class in Stent Family Hall: the Pacificas will coach the Chamber Music Institute students in works by Beethoven (the enigmatic Opus 135, played by the LK String Quartet) and Debussy. In the evening comes the second of three performances of “Mendelssohn Perspectives” (8:00 p.m., Stent Family Hall).