Takács Quartet cellist András Fejér reflects on 51 years as part of the group

The Takács Quartet has been performing in different iterations around the world for around five decades, including NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert last year.

The group will be part of a concert series put on by the Phoenix Chamber Music Society on Friday night in Paradise Valley.

Through all of the changes, one member of the original quartet remains: cellist András Fejér. He will, though, be retiring at the end of this season, after 51 years.

The Show spoke with Fejér about how he describes what the Takács is.

Full conversation

ANDRÁS FEJÉR: Well, I flatter myself by describing us, that classical music group playing many, many gorgeous pieces from composer, starting with Hayden and ending in the contemporary list of wonderful today's composers.

MARK BRODIE: And that includes some compositions that have been written specifically for your group, right?

FEJÉR: Ever since Harumi joined the the quartet, our commissioning and playing contemporary music at least tripled. And it's wonderful because she's got personal contacts with most of them. And in fact, she's already been championing many pieces of these wonderful composers. And we are happy just to trust her judgment and smilingly reap the results.

BRODIE: How would you describe the evolution of the sound of the quartet? You mentioned that you've sort of recently started, you know, playing some more modern composers, some commissions. How would you describe the way that the sound of your group has evolved over the decades that you've been doing this?

FEJÉR: Well, I'm working and playing within the system, so I'm not the right type to judge, but I wouldn't describe our playing as the actual sound changes. The guiding principles have always been the same: namely, just give your best to describe the character of the music with the right attitude and expressivity. And once we decide that, then how can we project it towards the audience that they would have the same feeling and they would feel the same joy and admiration for the pieces what we do?

BRODIE: So I think it's worth mentioning this quartet has been around for more than 50 years now, and you are the only member who has been there the whole time. What is that like for you to see different colleagues sort of come in and leave over those five-plus decades?

FEJÉR: Funnily, it has never been about numbers or years played together. It's always been about the repertoire, how many Haydens or Beethovens or Brahms or Bartoks or contemporary pieces we are supposed to play in any given seasons. Once that's decided, we just start to work. If after five or 10 years we return to the same piece, it will still be a Hayden or a Beethoven, just slightly different because we change what we learn or read about certain pieces, they all change.

Or one of us or many of us wishes to change some color or trying a different idea. Those are all something which are in flux. So all the time, it's a wonderfully ever changing organism.

BRODIE: How do you go about trying to decide what changes to make and how to make them? I mean, there are four of you. You're sort of the senior statesman there. But what's the process like for saying, "OK, we've done this before, let's maybe try it differently this way," or "We've never done this before, this is the way we think we should do it now"?

FEJÉR: When we were young, restless and naive, we thought that the only solution to any problem is my way or his way. But after 10, 15 years listening to master tapes or various radio recordings, we realized that unlike in many departments of the big picture of the world, in music, in phrasing, there are no one good solution.

So many things can work as long as, A, we have an argument that the composer might have thought about it this way; or B, that it's convincing as is in its new present form.

BRODIE: Well, that's interesting. So you sort of take a step back and think about what the composer might have been thinking before you take any sort of — I don't know if you would consider them like radical changes, but like, you don't want to sort of step outside what the composer was thinking with how you're interpreting it.

FEJÉR: No, no, no, no. In our upbringing and ever since our first wonderful coaching with András Mihály at the Franz Liszt, the first and foremost thing was what did the composer want? Or in most cases, as we didn't get any letter from Brahms or Hayden, you know, what is it that he possibly wanted based on our knowledge of the matter or knowledge of his other pieces, or knowledge of various paintings from the same era or literature? Those are all little helping hands to confirm or contradict whatever we wish to do.

So it's a fascinating thing and we keep arguing that's how we still feel fresh. And hopefully the audience would feel the same way.