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The essence of Elvis Costello's programming for his Meltdown festival at London's South Bank seems to be a synthesis of musical diversity. But in attempting to be all-encompassing, several of the concerts ended up pleasing everyone some of the time but hardly anyone all of the time.
The first of the two Brodsky Quartet concerts at the Queen Elizabeth Hall is a case in point. The conventional classical fans had their Haydn and Shostakovich, the new-music fans their Sculthorpe and Woolrich, the world-music followers their Indian tabla, but the result was diluted into mediocrity.
Only the Shostakovich, his powerful, introverted Eighth quartet, made a lasting impression. Pawel Szymanski's Five Pieces for string quartet began promisingly, but, overall, concept triumphed over content, as Szymanski seemed to take a different string technique in turn and work it to death.
Even The Death of King Renaud by John Woolrich, was demonstrably unexciting, while Michael Thomas, the Brodsky's leader, said it all when admitting the key to writing a composition is a good title. In his Harold in Islington, a musical depiction of a cycling sandwich salesman, the title was indeed the best thing about it; the music consisted of incessant, Nymanesque syncopated arpeggios, while the quintuple metre suggested a sticky bottom bracket.
Andy Rushton's Awakening had its moments, using Indian tabla and tampura, with the Brodsky strings imitating the whining sounds (and I don't mean that pejoratively) of Indian modal melodies.
The Brodskys' second Queen Elizabeth Hall concert could hardly have been more different, with a late (inconvenient) hour, mood lighting, sound system and Costello himself as the centre of attention. The first half revolved around excerpts from The Juliet Letters, Costello and the Brodskys' well-travelled collaboration. But their idea of a synthesis between a classical string quartet and pop/rock vocalising sounded awkward.
It wasn't helped by Costello's uncomfortable rock-style singing in this intimate musical context. His whining tone (here I do mean it pejoratively) and tell-tale mid-Atlantic accent that all rock singers affect proved wearing.
The quartet song arrangements themselves (mostly by the players) were good, more than can be said of those made for the enlarged ensemble that amassed after the interval under the baton of Diego Masson. These — of Costello numbers new and old — suffered from unnecessary amplification.
Amid this "meltdown", Musica Antigua Koln's Wigmore Hall concert came as something of a balm. It formed a highlight of the Lufthansa Festival of Baroque Music which, this year, unsurprisingly, is centring on the music of Purcell. Musica Antigua's programme, however, concentrated on the fascinating cultural interaction of German and English composers.
This meant going back to the roots of German ensemble music, with the earliest known consort pieces represented by some fantasias by Paul Leutkeman (1550-1610) on Lutheran hymn tunes and some recently discovered sonatas by Heinrich Bach, the only known instrumental works by the family from the generation of J. S. Bach's great uncle. The most potent Anglo-German connection, however, was made in two Lachrymae variations by Heinrich Scheidemann and Johann Schop, followed by the pavans from John Dowland's own great Lachrimae or Seaven Teares.
Musica Antigua Kean appeared under the direction of Reinhard Goebel in its chamber music guise. They brought as much variation to their playing as the expressive range of the music — either earnest or melancholy — and the timbral range of the period instruments would allow, but their sheer authority held the attention.
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