The 92nd Street Y is to be lavishly praised for its mounting of the family concert of the Zukerman Chamber Players, a concert geared toward children that contained absolutely no condescension whatsoever. Actor F. Murray Abraham, dressed casually, simply appeared on stage and briefly introduced himself, pausing only to comment on how a serendipitous casting in the role of Antonio Salieri in Milos Forman’s film “Amadeus” changed his life by introducing him to many musicians and their fascinating creative process. Since it seems most young people in America today receive the bulk of their history from Hollywood anyway, it was natural for a character from this complex, if totally false, story to guide them on a musical journey.

Mr. Abraham read passages not from the film but rather from the original Peter Shaffer play, most notably the “ghosts of the future” opening monologue. He was impressive, quickly demonstrating by example the differences between movie and live-theater acting. Once he roped us all in with his resonant voice, he broke the fourth wall and involved all audience members in his here and now. This was an inventive way to draw in the younger crowd and all showed their appreciation with hearty applause and laughter as appropriate.

For the musical portion of the day, Pinchas Zukerman introduced a quintet he formed from his association with the National Arts Centre Orchestra of Canada. The group — Mr. Zukerman and Jessica Linnebach, violins, Jethro Marks and Ashan Pillai, violas, and Amanda Forsyth, cello — began with one of the undeniable masterpieces of their particular repertoire, Mozart’s G Minor Quintet.

Fate and death are the two themes of this grim work. The best way for me to describe the seriousness of the piece is probably to point out that it was written while Mozart was in the throes of composing Don Giovanni. Mr. Forman’s imagery of the masked father figure in the film is the perfect anthropomorphic emblem of the mood of this piece. The Chamber Players presented a rather idiosyncratic, but decidedly thought-provoking take on the essay.

This granitic rumination is often played magisterially at a relatively loud volume. Mr. Z and friends, however, eschewed this approach, opting instead for a gentle, quiet realization. This allowed the group to expostulate unhurriedly, to dwell on the metaphysical aspects of this peek over the edge of the abyss. The group suffers from a common ailment: There is only one experienced veteran. Mr. Zukerman’s tone is naturally far superior to that of his young charges, and so the net aural effect is an ersatz violin concerto. This led to a somewhat unfortunate imbalance and occasionally derailed the cerebral nature of this otherwise excellent reading.

When the players turned to Brahms, their weak tones had a disastrous effect. Brahms decided to retire from composition while still at the height of his powers, and he chose the String Quintet No. 2 as his swan song. No matter that he later reneged on his promise and proceeded to complete all of those marvelous valedictory works for clarinet. At the time (1890), he was serious about falling silent.

The problem this day was that the expansive, rollicking opening of the Allegro non troppo requires a cellist of extraordinary power, and Ms. Forsyth, although pure in tone, is simply not ready for so zaftig a passage. All sounded rather anemic in this first movement and things simply deteriorated from there. The opening theme of the Adagio was stated lovingly by the violas. But as the movement correctly progressed to higher and higher levels of volume, the quintet cracked through the shrillness barrier, producing some fingernails-onthe-blackboard sounds I am sure they would like to erase from memory. Ultimately, the fault lies not in their performance, but in their choice of music. If Mr. Zukerman did indeed program the Brahms, then it is legitimate to call him to task. Had the group stuck to a sweeter sounding quintet, say one by Boccherini, this might have been a consistently satisfying concert.

As usual at a concert with children in attendance, there were some signs of bad behavior, including excessive talking, plastic bag rustling, and loud snacking. However, from my perch up in the photographer’s aerie, I observed that all these transgressions were perpetrated exclusively by adults.