Sadly we can’t get to the Wigmore Hall concert tonight to hear the Pavel Haas for the first time in their (wonderfully promising) new line up.
It must have been a great blow to them when their founder violist Pavel Nikl had to leave the Quartet in 2016 because of family illness. His replacement Radim Sedmidubský is a fine player, but somehow (to me at any rate) he never felt an entirely comfortable fit for the quartet; and, for whatever reason, he left at the end of 2017. The Pavel Haas played a few concerts with Pavel Nikl again, but he hasn’t been able to rejoin them. And so they teamed up with the young composer/conductor/violist Jiří Kabát, and played a few concerts earlier in year, and he has now officially joined the Quartet.
Every sign is that this promises to be a happy match with another very serious and gifted musician who can play with the intense commitment of the other three. Though that’s too solemn a way to put it — a Facebook post from the Quartet after their first official outing together showed beaming smiles all round with the simple comment “Feeling wonderful”. Very much hope to catch them in London in September …