String quartets; what is in a name.

I have always been unhappy with the names of string quartets. No matter how many times string quartets (and trios) change personnel they use the same name. I think they should at least indicate the change. This is a letter I wrote about it to the Editor of Fanfare magazine, my favorite classical music review magazine. Reading it has cost me a lot of money--all worth it.

Editor,

I always read with interest your reviewers’ often heroic “genealogical” attempts at clarifying the make-up of string quartet groups like the Borodin (28:5, p. 84), the Takàcs (28:5, p. 86,), the Juilliard, or the Budapest of yore. Frankly, I find these difficult to follow, let alone remember.

I know keeping the original name is a time-honored tradition. Still I wonder at the desperate attempts of the groups to keep the same name even when the thread with the original name is extremely tenuous, and when even their styles of playing is drastically different from those of the seminal members. I suspect that no little financial consideration is involved in keeping the original name; after all I don’t think the audience in the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society would still flock to the performance of the 8th generation of the Juilliard Quartet if instead of that hallowed name the group took on a different one. Nor would record companies be nearly as eager to contract them to record still another traversal of the same repertoire, as has been the case, for instance, with the ever-young Beaux Arts trio, which too has gone through more metamorphoses than was dreamt of in Ovid’s philosophy. I suspect, like death and taxes, the Juilliard or the Takàcs will always be with us.

As a contribution to truth-in-advertising my recommendation for your reviewers is to at least append a numeral to the name of the Quartet to indicate the descendancy. After all, it was done to all the French Kings called Louis.

May I suggest the following designation for the Juilliard . (I am not a discographer so it is possible that the list is not correct):

Juilliard 1: 1946-55, Mann, Koff, Hillyer, Winograd
Juilliard 2: 1955-58, Mann, Koff, Hillyer, Adam
Juilliard 3: 1958-66, Mann, Cohen, Hillyer, Adam
Juilliard 4: 1966-69, Mann, Carlyss, Hillyer, Adam
Juilliard 5: 1969-74, Mann, Carlyss, Rhodes, Adam
Juilliard 6: 1974-86, Mann, Carlyss, Rhodes, Krosnick
Juilliard 7: 1986-96, Mann, Smirnoff, Rhodes, Krosnick
Juilliard 8: 1996-? Smirnoff, Copes, Rhodes, Krosnick
Juilliard 18: 20??