by Daniel Hathaway

“Every time a string quartet replaces a player, it becomes a new quartet,” said Cleveland Institute of Music President Joel Smirnoff, when asked to give a few remarks before the Cleveland Chamber Music Society’s concert by the Juilliard String Quartet at Plymouth Church on December 4.

Smirnoff is in a position to know about that. Having played with the Juilliard since 1986, he moved from second to first fiddle in 1997 before withdrawing in 2008 to take up his new duties in Cleveland. Since then, there have been two more new first violinists. The latest, Joseph Lin, joined only last year and would be making his Cleveland debut on Tuesday evening. You have to imagine that Smirnoff and CIM’s chamber music festival had something to do with the large number of students who packed the house to the point where the ushers ran out of programs — a nice problem for a chamber music society to have.  [Read more…]