Oftentimes the all-star games aren't particularly good team events; but anyone who takes that view with regard to this pair of performances by some of the heaviest hitters in the business will miss some glorious music-making! Actually, not all of them are especially heavy, but the simile is apt.

Schubert's Quintet is one of chamber music's greatest treasures, and there have been some grand recordings of it; but the present crowd brings to this reading a degree of intensity, perhaps stemming from the respect and admiration the players clearly feel for one another, that is unique in my experience with this score. You'll find comparable electricity in some of the other stellar versions—most notably on RCA, whose great ensemble is headed by Heifetz; and on CBS/Sony, where a considerably younger Stern does the honors but Casals's presence seems to dominate. Those who prefer to concentrate on the music itself, as opposed to the musicians, will perhaps admire even more the grand ensemble playing achieved by various guests, with such core groups as the Emerson, Hollywood, Guarneri, and Melos Quartets (in two of which recordings Rostro-povich figures). But the present reading easily stands among the best of these, and those who are swayed by superior sound need look no further, for most of the artistically competitive versions I have cited aren't DDD.

The second movement of this quintet is one of the most moving pieces of music I have ever heard, and if it matters to our readership I will confess I had a very hard time getting past it on this CD—I repeated the Adagio five times before 1 allowed the performance to continue, so taken was I with both the work and this reading.

The release is further enhanced by a lovely realization of the original source of Boccherini's ubiquitous Minuet. This E-Major Quintet isn't quite in the same league as the Schubert, but the players' level of commitment is nonetheless comparable. The sound is equally fine, and hearing the whole thing, as opposed to the well-known snippet, is certainly worthwhile—and, as it happens, there's not much competition, other than Denon's version with the Berlin Philharmonia Ensemble. Note that two different times are shown on the cover—64:50 and 76:12. The latter is correct. For the Schubert, then, this is recommended with a degree of fervor that grips me only rarely.

-- John W. Lambert, FANFARE [5/1997]