Ann Tomowa-Simtow, Wigmore Hall, London <br/>Juilliard Quartet, Queen Elizabeth Hall, London

CLASSICAL | Two cheers for an old favourite

This has been a week in which to celebrate musical longevity, even if the decades of experience were not always worn lightly. In a career spanning 35 years, the Bulgarian soprano Anna Tomowa-Simtow has established herself as one of opera's grandes dames, and the warmth of the applause that greeted her at last Tuesday's recital expressed genuine affection from the Wigmore connoisseurs.

This has been a week in which to celebrate musical longevity, even if the decades of experience were not always worn lightly. In a career spanning 35 years, the Bulgarian soprano Anna Tomowa-Simtow has established herself as one of opera's grandes dames, and the warmth of the applause that greeted her at last Tuesday's recital expressed genuine affection from the Wigmore connoisseurs.

Tomowa-Simtow carries her operatic manner with her when she takes the recital platform. At first she leans comfortably against the piano, as if this is her drawing room, but everyone knows it's her stage. Not for her the buttoned-up decorum of the traditional recital: she invests each piece with the head-on drama she brings to the opera house.

For Tchaikovsky, she displayed that marvellously Slavic vocalisation in which, without compromising beauty, the sound seems to emerge from the very back of the mouth. In "It was in the Early Spring", she apostrophised forest and sunshine with the intensity of the Straussian heroines that have been her speciality. She almost sobbed in "To Forget so Soon", and finished "He Loved me so Much" in desolate melancholy. If the tone was sometimes pinched and the beat in the voice heavy, she wore Tchaikovsky's heart on her sleeve.

Things went less her way in the German repertory that followed. For one thing, she swallowed too many of the consonants that carry so much of the expression. Nevertheless Wagner's Wesendonk Lieder can take a bit of operatic amplitude; after all, the composer labelled "In the Greenhouse" a "study for Tristan und Isolde". But too often Tomowa-Simtow scooped upwards to the note, while her vocal wobble became more pronounced, and the tough chest voice has become a well-worn protective device required when the expressive reserves are low.

The audience response was enthusiastic but a few empty seats appeared after the interval. Her Brahms proved as operatic as her Wagner. Again the voice tended to wander from the centre of the note, the tone spreading under pressure. Yet she is a singer who gives, and gives generously, even if she made Brahms too gaudy. She closed her programme with five of Richard Strauss's most popular songs. While the emotions were in place in general terms, the details revealed still more signs of vocal wear, and although she brought an operatic crescendo to the climax of "Cecily", many left as soon as the song ended. But more still stayed for her extended encores, which, as usual, included her accompanying herself at the piano: always a crowd-pleaser, that.

From a veteran to the Juilliard Quartet, the world's longest-established string quartet, having made its debut in 1946. The personnel has changed, of course: the last surviving founder retired five years ago, leaving the viola player Samuel Rhodes the longest serving member, with a mere 33 years to his credit. Last weekend's performance opened with Haydn's Sunrise Quartet, its opening movement marked con spirito. And a bit more spirit might not have gone amiss. Or perhaps I have become too fond of the sounds of period instruments in Haydn. Rhodes's well-projected viola had a very human, crying quality that was most moving; but then in the Adagio, the music at times seemed in danger of grinding to a standstill.

If Haydnesque joie de vivre is not the Juilliard's strength, the stonier, not to say po-faced Beethoven suited them better. In the second movement of his Serioso Quartet, the heavy tread of the cello's descending figure had an appropriate gravity, and there was anguished urgency in the Allegro, but the fourth movement again risked losing forward momentum. That is how the Juilliard hears the music; and there's no doubt that airier period instruments sometimes lack the necessary weight; but I think both Haydn and Beethoven have more vigour than this.

On the other hand, the quixotic moods of Sibelius' Voces intimae got all the urgency that you could wish for. As the work opened, Joel Smirnoff's violin and Joel Krosnick's cello seemed to be calling across a great distance, even though they were only feet apart. Then in the third movement, wisps of mournful melody shuddered from one instrument to the next. As for the frenzied fiddling that brings the quartet to a close, the Juilliard handled it superbly, maintaining unity while suggesting that things might fly out of control at any moment. Experience pays off.

Anna Picard returns next week