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SOMM Recordings

Elgar & Faure: String Quartets

$18.99

Details

Composer
Edward Elgar, Gabriel Faure
Artist
Eusebius Quartet
Format
CD
Label
SOMM Recordings
Released
May 16, 2025
Catalog #
SOMMCD 0703
UPC
748871070325

About

The newest release from SOMM Recordings is an unusual but exciting pairing of two string quartets by British and French contemporaries Sir Edward Elgar (1857-1934) and Gabriel Faure (1845-1924). Also included is a collection of shorter gems transcribed for string quartet by the British composer, arranger, and pianist Iain Farrington. These comprise Elgar's Carissima (originally composed for small orchestra) and selections from Faure's Piano Preludes: Nos. 4, 8, and 9, this last described by Aaron Copland as being "so absolutely simple that we can never hope to understand how it can contain such great emotional power." This recording features the Eusebius Quartet, formed in 2016 out of a passion for the extraordinary music written for this instrumentation, and praised as "excellent" by The Sunday Times. Their debut CD for SOMM of the Korngold Piano Quintet & Quartet (SOMMCD 0642) received critical acclaim: "Wit and clarity abound in the Quartet's Viennese-sounding performances, " The Strad; "The musicians seem to feel the music just as it is, complex on the surface, but direct and straight from the heart, " BBC Music Magazine. Elgar and Faure met once at the time of the London premiere of Elgar's First Symphony in 1908. Although Faure spoke no English and Elgar's French wasn't exactly conversational, it's fascinating to compare the musical language of their two quartets, both in the key of E minor, and written late in the composers' lives. Edward Elgar was a more than competent violinist, and he made several attempts throughout his career to write a string quartet. Finally, ill and depressed by war-time London in 1918, he completed his String Quartet, Op. 83. It is cast in three movements, the outer Allegro movements bookending one marked Piacevole (poco andante). This slow middle movement, which contains a quotation from Elgar's Chanson de Matin, was a favourite of Lady Elgar, who described it as "captured sunshine." It was played at her funeral in 1920. Gabriel Faure composed his only String Quartet, Op. 121 in 1924, shortly before his death at the age of 79. By this time, he had been totally deaf for some years, and the quartet suggests a mind driven within itself in a way that hints at Beethoven's Late String Quartets. This final work of Faure presents an extraordinary duality, which masks the romantic ideas of his earlier music with what the English composer and writer Robert Matthew-Walker calls "a soft steely twilight that at times appears almost menacing." As with Elgar's quartet, the central Andante movement particularly captures the imagination with it's musical colouration suggesting a world of half-lights.

Tracklist 10 tracks

  1. 1 I. Allegro moderato 09:33
    Track
    1
    Title
    I. Allegro moderato
    Duration
    09:33
    Composer
    Edward Elgar
    Ensemble
    Eusebius Quartet
  2. 2 II. Piacevole (poco andante) 10:05
    Track
    2
    Title
    II. Piacevole (poco andante)
    Duration
    10:05
    Composer
    Edward Elgar
    Ensemble
    Eusebius Quartet
  3. 3 III. Allegro molto 09:30
    Track
    3
    Title
    III. Allegro molto
    Duration
    09:30
    Composer
    Edward Elgar
    Ensemble
    Eusebius Quartet
  4. 4 Carissima (arr. I. Farrington for string quartet) 04:20
    Track
    4
    Title
    Carissima (arr. I. Farrington for string quartet)
    Duration
    04:20
    Composer
    Edward Elgar
    Ensemble
    Eusebius Quartet
  5. 5 I. Allegro moderato 07:37
    Track
    5
    Title
    I. Allegro moderato
    Duration
    07:37
    Composer
    Gabriel Fauré
    Ensemble
    Eusebius Quartet
  6. 6 II. Andante 10:24
    Track
    6
    Title
    II. Andante
    Duration
    10:24
    Composer
    Gabriel Fauré
    Ensemble
    Eusebius Quartet
  7. 7 III. Allegro 08:27
    Track
    7
    Title
    III. Allegro
    Duration
    08:27
    Composer
    Gabriel Fauré
    Ensemble
    Eusebius Quartet
  8. 8 Prelude No. 4 in F Major 02:02
    Track
    8
    Title
    Prelude No. 4 in F Major
    Duration
    02:02
    Composer
    Gabriel Fauré
    Ensemble
    Eusebius Quartet
  9. 9 Prelude No. 8 in C Minor 01:11
    Track
    9
    Title
    Prelude No. 8 in C Minor
    Duration
    01:11
    Composer
    Gabriel Fauré
    Ensemble
    Eusebius Quartet
  10. 10 Prelude No. 9 in E Minor 04:05
    Track
    10
    Title
    Prelude No. 9 in E Minor
    Duration
    04:05
    Composer
    Gabriel Fauré
    Ensemble
    Eusebius Quartet