Concert review: Frank Huang (violin) Pei-Shan Lee (piano) Philip Ying (viola) David Ying (cello) Hieyon Choi (piano)

Since 2015, Frank Huang has wowed audiences as concertmaster of the New York Philharmonic, which means that hearing him in chamber music is a rare treat. He opened this Bowdoin Festival recital with Saint-Saëns’s Introduction and Rondo capriccioso, combining equal amounts of nostalgia and pure fire. The pianist Pei-Shan Lee (who has taught at the New England Conservatory since 2009) made an ideal collaborator, graciously retreating, metaphorically, when the violinist soared amid the composer’s quicksilver passages. 

The pair returned for Beethoven’s ‘Kreutzer’ Sonata, with the duo on a bobsled down this Matterhorn of storytelling. In the first movement, Huang’s crisp bow strokes seemed to inspire Lee to match his tautness and concision. Underlining the partnership, Huang also withdrew when, for example, the piano leapt into the foreground, scurrying through the tarantella’s main theme in the finale. 

Ending the evening was Dvořák’s Piano Quartet no.2, with Huang joined by violist Philip Ying, cellist David Ying and HieYon Choi at the piano. All four found the right balance between drawing room gentility and outright aggression: the latter was welcome in the turbulent parts of the second movement. The unfettered brilliance reached a climax in the finale, when Huang and his crew carefully paced the finale, not giving away the game until they accelerated on the final page. No surprise that the whoops and cheers began almost instantly.

BRUCE HODGES