Chamber music has the uncanny ability to transform the grandest concert hall into an intimate yet exciting setting where magic and fantasy come to life. Such was the case Saturday night when the Tokyo String Quartet brought crisp, refreshing sounds to the Maine Center for the Arts. Carefully considering each musical nuance and executing notes with fierce detail, the four string musicians played more than two hours, offering a full and lustrous selection of chamber music.

The first piece, Mozart’s Quartet No. 21 in D Major, K. 575, gave a glorious sampling of how this group works so tightly together to create full-bodied, textured music. The rhythmic repetition of phrases moved through the MCA like wind over waves or droplets of rainwater dancing in a spring downpour. Whether the motifs were lighthearted or dark, the Tokyo String Quartet blended their instruments with poetic clarity and amazing virtuosity.

It was truly a rare treat to hear Toru Takemitsu’s contemporary piece “A way a lone.” Discordant, disturbing, abstract and dramatic, this piece was like an artistic soundtrack to a pyschological thriller. With stormy cadences and ominous silences, the unusual sounds seemed to reach deep into primal disorder. Like James Joyce’s “Finnegan’s Wake,” from which it takes its name, “A way a lone” was one long dream, filled with distortions, echoes, divinity and terror. When the musicians finished playing this demanding number, they held their final positions for one frozen moment. During this tableau, the audience seemed to freeze, too, unsure of the musical perimeters. Similar to its literary analogue, this strange, unpredictable and daring music was challenging and dynamic.

During the second half of the concert, the group performed Beethoven’s Quartet in B-flat Major, Op. 130 with Grosse Fuge, Op. 133, a gigantic quartet that was originally regarded as incomprehensible and bizarre. It is a piece of extreme contrasts and frequent sudden shifts of character. The first elaborate movement mixes deeper themes and slow tempos with a teasing quickness before moving on to a two-minute presto which is both quiet and lively. The Tokyo String Quartet flew through the themes and transitions as swiftly as a soaring bird.

But the ensemble showed particular skill during the last three movements. With absolutely spot-on intonation, the musicians offered the waltz-like Allegro, the lyrical Cavantina and, most striking of all, the Grosse Fuge. Beethoven is said to have cried each time he heard the Cavantina, so melancholy the theme. Yet, the Tokyo String Quartet found a loving joyfulness, too. And the energy of the final movement, which was slightly reminscient of the Takemitsu piece, was truly vehement and moving.

For an encore, the group played the rousing second movement of Ravel’s string quartet. A most refined and integrated rendition, the piece was tender, unrestrained, polished and playful, the perfect end to a delightful and satisfying evening of chamber music performed by world-class artists.