Chamber Society | T-shirts and varied, charming program

Another sold-out concert at the Seattle Chamber Music Society.

This year's festival has been one of the most popular in the Society's history. On Monday, the musical rewards were as variable as the repertoire, which ranged through several different styles and eras.

The concert began on a musical-question note — Ives' infrequently-heard Largo for Violin, Clarinet and Piano, a short little "unanswered question" of its own that got a really thoughtful performance by violinist Stefan Jackiw, clarinetist Alexander Fiterstein and pianist Jeremy Denk. (Some of the festival's male players have adapted the summer white-jacket dress code to include black collarless T-shirts, by the way, which looks very cool in both senses of the word.)

The same trio was back in action for a considerably more entertaining reading of Milhaud's "Le voyageur sans bagages" Suite, full of jazzy energy and huge, overstated contrasts that drew several rounds of laughter from the audience. Jackiw and Fiterstein traded themes so neatly in one movement that they sounded like a pair of twins who finish each other's sentences. Jackiw's lovely, fully nuanced violin proved a perfect match for Fiterstein's dulcet clarinet; Denk was in top insouciant form at the keyboard.

Mozart's C Major Quintet (K.515) is one of the nicest of his viola quintets, and it got an attentive, spacious performance from violinists Daniela Shtereva and Jackiw, violists Aloysia Friedmann and Richard O'Neill, and cellist Joshua Roman. Shtereva provided a very musical lead, despite some uneven playing; everyone had fine individual moments as well as a careful ear for the ensemble as a whole.

The finale, Arensky's D Minor Piano Trio (Op. 32), has found its way onto several festival programs in past years. While Arensky works some of the trio's themes almost to death, it can (and did) charm an audience when played with the kind of passion afforded on Monday by violinist Nicola Benedetti, cellist Amit Peled and pianist Adam Neiman.

Melinda Bargreen: mbargreen@seattletimes.com