The Mozart K.589 B-flat major Quartet, written a year before the composer's death, was in some ways the most revelatory performance. Even after years of revisionism, Mozart is too often treated as a porcelain doll, delicate, an exquisite relic borrowed from a museum display. Skampa infused this music with blood and guts, and the music leapt off the stage. The bracing brusqueness of their approach did not obscure the astonishing harmonic inventiveness of Mozart, or his supreme grasp of musical architecture, all the while bringing his intrinsic passion and vocal expressiveness to the fore.

Shostakovich came to the string quartet format well into his mature career, but eventually left a body of work that may well be his most important legacy. The third quartet was written in 1946, when Russia, though victorious over Nazism, was still a vast wasteland of unspeakable devastation and grief. The music features a searing juxtaposition of explosive anger and bottomless sorrow, and, in typical Shostakovich style, flashes of sardonic wit, all knitted together with supreme virtuosity. The Skampa players easily handled the daunting technical demands of the piece; the occasional rough edge or blurred intonation only enhanced the gritty elegance of it all.

It was only in the Beethoven, the first of his "Razumovsky" Quartets, that Skampa's one-size-fits-all approach ran into some trouble. This is Beethoven at the summit of his powers. Skampa handily conveyed the familiar swagger and bold power of the music, but their exuberance skirted the thin layer below this surface, where thousands of miracles of musical microcosm lay waiting to be revealed by a careful balance of vigor and subtlety. It is the converse situation to Mozart, whose refinement is nearly impossible to obscure. Finding it in Beethoven requires more effort, but the payoff is immense.

Skampa Quartet March 24, Benjamin Franklin Hall