It takes more than a nice instrument to make a viola sing, and anyone who has ever been to a viola recital can testify to that.

Which is why when Laurence Burkhalter, former violist of the locally and nationally-acclaimed Ames Piano Quartet, retired, remaining members of the group were less than thrilled.

“It was traumatic for all of us,” violinist Mahlon Darlington said. “He’d been with the group from the beginning. We weren’t sure we’d be able to find someone to fill his shoes.”

When Burkhalter announced his resignation, the remaining quartet members (Darlington, cellist George Work and pianist William David) began brainstorming for ideas on where they could find a violist to take his place.

Work said the group decided against an open audition because they didn’t want just any violist in the important position. A list of three violists compiled of musician acquaintances from past performances and various music circles, were asked to audition and were given five weeks to practice the quartet music.

“In this type of audition, sight reading is not an issue,” Work said.

One of the candidates asked to audition was Johnathan Sturm, Des Moines Symphony concertmaster, former violin/viola professor at Drake University and long time friend of most of the quartet members.

Sturm said as soon as he got the music for the audition, he had already decided that five weeks wasn’t enough.

“I wanted a year,” Sturm said. “I have rarely practiced as hard as I did for that audition. I wanted as long as possible to prepare.”

His hard practicing paid off when Sturm was selected to be the quartet’s new violist. Needless to say, he was ecstatic.

“I always wanted to be part of a quartet of this quality,” Sturm said. “I’ve always wanted to make music at this level. It’s been a dream of mine since I was 17.”

Although one of the main reasons Sturm was interested in the group was because of its musicianship, he was also impressed with the fact that the quartet had national management and toured cities he enjoyed visiting.

During the past two months Sturm has been with the quartet, the musicians have all learned new musical things together — and had fun in the process.

“We laugh a lot,” Sturm said. “I’ve never been in a group where I’ve respected all the musicians and felt like I could say whatever I wanted because I respected the musicians.”

Sturm’s first performance as the new violist for the Ames Piano Quartet will be Sunday at 7:30 p.m. in the Music Hall Recital Hall. The concert is free to the public.