In its first season with the new makeup, the Emerson has revisited works that have not only been a staple of its concert repertory but in many ways helped build its brand. The quartet’s 2000 recording of the complete Shostakovich quartets is responsible for two of the Grammys on Mr. Drucker’s shelf; it won in the categories of best chamber and best classical recording.

As Mr. Watkins describes it, stepping into Mr. Finckel’s shoes — “a guy who seems to have very few weak points” — required a balance of respectful study of his predecessor’s habits and confidence in his own musical personality. When he joined the quartet, Mr. Dutton handed him a suitcase full of Mr. Finckel’s cello parts. But few of them had any of his markings, so Mr. Watkins familiarized himself with recordings and videos of the quartet. And during the morning’s rehearsal, the three veterans often referred to the way Mr. Finckel had bowed or phrased a particular passage.

“At this stage, I owe it to the quartet to see what they’ve been doing for the last 30-odd years,” Mr. Watkins said. “They’ve worked intensely on these pieces, so I should have a look. I do have some of the Emerson recordings anyway, and particularly the Bartok was one I grew up with. I’ve never been the sort of monastic, mustn’t listen to other recordings sort of musician. If I’m going to find a good idea, I’m going to steal it.”

Yet Mr. Drucker said that “with each of these pieces, something has changed, something’s evolving.”

“At first, Paul was trying to fit into what we were doing,” he said. “That would be a logical thing to do for anybody who’s joining a group that’s been playing together for however many years. You’re not going to come in and say, ‘O.K., let’s do this whole thing backwards.’ Paul is so quick in learning, in having a sense of what the music is all about, and his antennae are finely tuned. We do it once, and he knows exactly what we’ve got. And then as we do it again, it starts to change slightly. I don’t even know if he’s conscious of it, or whether that’s just the more natural way of doing it for him.”

Mr. Watkins recalled an article in a trade magazine surveying string quartets that had swapped in new members. “As you’d expect, there was a whole spread of opinion as to how to go about it, “ he said. “There was one cellist saying he felt if he didn’t go in with all guns blazing from Rehearsal 1, saying, ‘This is how I do it,’ he’d never have a chance. And there was another one who said she’d decided not to say anything for a whole season.”