Share
Charlotte Chamber Music had no choice. St. Peter's Episcopal Church uptown, the site of the group's concerts for more than a decade, closed its sanctuary for a remodeling. So the series switched to a temporary location nearby: First Presbyterian Church on West Trade Street.
Surprise! Chamber music comes off better at First Presbyterian.
The first program there, in February, wasn't much of a test. An organ, trumpet and soprano can make themselves heard most anywhere. But when a string quintet played there in March, that settled it. The group sounded fuller and warmer than strings ever do at St. Peter's.
If you weren't on hand then, you can decide for yourself Tuesday, when the Triad-based Degas Quartet visits for the series' April installment.
The acoustics at St. Peter's have always struck me as dry. And for a while now, something else has nagged at me in listening to Calin Lupanu, the Charlotte Symphony's first-chair violinist, or Alan Black, the principal cellist, when they've played at St. Peter's. At the church, their instruments have seemed tinny. The same instruments have bloomed, though, during orchestral concerts at the Belk Theater.
I'll leave it to an expert to explain, assuming he or she would agree. My hunch is that the church's low ceiling – low by church or concert-hall standards – contributes to the dryness.
For music lovers, the reasons that First Presbyterian works better don't really matter, do they? Just enjoy it while it lasts.
