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SaleSchubert & Beethoven: String Quartets / New Orford String Quartet
Bridge Records · Jul 2011CD$18.99$14.99 -
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SaleHeise: The String Quartets, Vol. 1 / Nordic String Quartet
Dacapo Classical · Jun 2023CD$17.99$8.99 -
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Schubert & Beethoven: String Quartets / New Orford String Quartet
Bridge Records
CD
$14.99
$18.99
Save 20%
Jul 12, 2011
SCHUBERT String Quartet No. 15. BEETHOVEN String No. 16 • New Orford Str Qrt • BRIDGE 9363 (74:47)
This would be an impressive release for any seasoned ensemble; all the more so then that it marks the New Orford String Quartet’s debut album. An ensemble entering into the fray of such highly competitive arenas as Schubert’s and Beethoven’s quartets often raises the question critics invariably ask, “Do these performances offer new insights or have something special to say?” To that I can answer with a most emphatic yes.
“Unstable” is a key word in describing Schubert’s G-Major Quartet—harmonically unstable in its vacillation between major and minor and its undermining of tonality; rhythmically unstable in its strange leaping figures and shuddering tremolos; and most of all, emotionally unstable in its dizzying mood swings, evidence of a mind in the grip of a serious mental disorder. Much of Schubert’s private life and personal affairs has been revealed in recent years, but in many ways the boy-man remains an enigma.
Save for a fragment of a string quartet in F Major that appears in the Schubert catalog as D 998, the G-Major Quartet is the end of the line for the composer’s string quartets, though it would not be his last great chamber work for strings. That would be the String Quintet in C Major, which came two years later, in 1828, not long before his death. In a number of ways, this G-Major work, the last of Schubert’s completed quartets, picks up where its immediate predecessor, the “Death and the Maiden” Quartet of 1824, left off. I’m reminded of what Mahler is reputed to have said in reply to someone who had asked him why the funeral march in his First Symphony was so much different from the funeral march in Beethoven’s “Eroica” Symphony. “Ah,” replied Mahler, “Beethoven describes the mourner; I depict the corpse.” Gruesome as the medical examiner’s lab imagery may be, Schubert’s G-Major Quartet strikes me as the Maiden on the autopsy table.
I don’t wish to go down the road of this analogy too far by saying that the New Orford Quartet’s performance resembles an autopsy on the deceased, but the ensemble’s reading does have a laser-sharp focus to it that lays bare every strand and fiber of the piece. The players take their time and exercise meticulous care, as well as respect, in cutting through and folding back the many layers of tissue. Oftentimes, performances of this work can have a frantic edge to them; I’m thinking, for example, of the recording by the Hagen Quartet. But tension built more slowly over longer arches can turn the emotional screws even tighter than sudden explosive outbursts. The New Orford’s reading of Schubert’s G-Major Quartet is an exemplary study in how to put the most elegant and refined playing to the purpose of delivering the most upsetting news—tragedy without the hysterics.
It’s obvious from the above interview that cellist Brian Manker and I don’t see completely eye-to-eye (or, should I say, don’t hear completely ear-to-ear?) on Beethoven’s final complete quartet, the F Major, op. 135. His speculation about the connection between the es in the Muss es sein introduction to the last movement and Es in German being the designation for E?, which could be an internal musical joke referring back to an event in the first movement, is certainly interesting and worth entertaining. But there is another joke, less abstruse, that has been connected to the Muss es sein incipit, and that is a scribbled note in which Beethoven is allegedly complaining about his housekeeper insisting on putting too much starch in his shirts: “Must it be? It must be.” This, in combination with the actual musical content of the movement, has always led me to hear the whole thing as a fairly lighthearted, even silly, romp. I think we would agree, however, that the Lento assai movement is one of Beethoven’s profoundest utterances.
The New Orford’s tempo at the outset of the quartet is a bit slower than I’m accustomed to hearing it. But it’s not one of the works Beethoven provided metronome markings for—only his quartets through op. 95 contain his own markings—and the first movement is marked Allegretto, so the New Orford’s reading may be entirely justified. But something else emerges at this slightly slower tempo that I find interesting and quite delightful, and that is a sly, slightly underplayed, tongue-in-cheek humor that tickles the funny bone in a different, perhaps more sophisticated way than other, more slapstick approaches.
Take, for example, the hiccups in the cello part that come shortly into the development section following the double bar and change of key signature to one sharp. Not a few cellists take these for rude, sophomoric belches, which, admittedly, is funny, especially if you’re into high school hijinks. But Manker sees these more as little burps that slip out embarrassedly in polite company, making them all the funnier for their lack of social propriety and grace. It puts me in mind of the long-circulated tale, 1601 , attributed to Mark Twain, in which he is privy to a conversation among Francis Bacon, Sir Walter Raleigh, Ben Johnson, and 16-year-old Francis Beaumonte engaged in sniffing out who broke wind in company of the Queen. If memory serves, I think the culprit turns out to be the Queen herself. Twain, of course (whether he was the author of this particular farce or not) can always be counted on to entertain and edify and, so too, I think, can the playing of the New Orford Quartet.
FANFARE: Jerry Dubins
This would be an impressive release for any seasoned ensemble; all the more so then that it marks the New Orford String Quartet’s debut album. An ensemble entering into the fray of such highly competitive arenas as Schubert’s and Beethoven’s quartets often raises the question critics invariably ask, “Do these performances offer new insights or have something special to say?” To that I can answer with a most emphatic yes.
“Unstable” is a key word in describing Schubert’s G-Major Quartet—harmonically unstable in its vacillation between major and minor and its undermining of tonality; rhythmically unstable in its strange leaping figures and shuddering tremolos; and most of all, emotionally unstable in its dizzying mood swings, evidence of a mind in the grip of a serious mental disorder. Much of Schubert’s private life and personal affairs has been revealed in recent years, but in many ways the boy-man remains an enigma.
Save for a fragment of a string quartet in F Major that appears in the Schubert catalog as D 998, the G-Major Quartet is the end of the line for the composer’s string quartets, though it would not be his last great chamber work for strings. That would be the String Quintet in C Major, which came two years later, in 1828, not long before his death. In a number of ways, this G-Major work, the last of Schubert’s completed quartets, picks up where its immediate predecessor, the “Death and the Maiden” Quartet of 1824, left off. I’m reminded of what Mahler is reputed to have said in reply to someone who had asked him why the funeral march in his First Symphony was so much different from the funeral march in Beethoven’s “Eroica” Symphony. “Ah,” replied Mahler, “Beethoven describes the mourner; I depict the corpse.” Gruesome as the medical examiner’s lab imagery may be, Schubert’s G-Major Quartet strikes me as the Maiden on the autopsy table.
I don’t wish to go down the road of this analogy too far by saying that the New Orford Quartet’s performance resembles an autopsy on the deceased, but the ensemble’s reading does have a laser-sharp focus to it that lays bare every strand and fiber of the piece. The players take their time and exercise meticulous care, as well as respect, in cutting through and folding back the many layers of tissue. Oftentimes, performances of this work can have a frantic edge to them; I’m thinking, for example, of the recording by the Hagen Quartet. But tension built more slowly over longer arches can turn the emotional screws even tighter than sudden explosive outbursts. The New Orford’s reading of Schubert’s G-Major Quartet is an exemplary study in how to put the most elegant and refined playing to the purpose of delivering the most upsetting news—tragedy without the hysterics.
It’s obvious from the above interview that cellist Brian Manker and I don’t see completely eye-to-eye (or, should I say, don’t hear completely ear-to-ear?) on Beethoven’s final complete quartet, the F Major, op. 135. His speculation about the connection between the es in the Muss es sein introduction to the last movement and Es in German being the designation for E?, which could be an internal musical joke referring back to an event in the first movement, is certainly interesting and worth entertaining. But there is another joke, less abstruse, that has been connected to the Muss es sein incipit, and that is a scribbled note in which Beethoven is allegedly complaining about his housekeeper insisting on putting too much starch in his shirts: “Must it be? It must be.” This, in combination with the actual musical content of the movement, has always led me to hear the whole thing as a fairly lighthearted, even silly, romp. I think we would agree, however, that the Lento assai movement is one of Beethoven’s profoundest utterances.
The New Orford’s tempo at the outset of the quartet is a bit slower than I’m accustomed to hearing it. But it’s not one of the works Beethoven provided metronome markings for—only his quartets through op. 95 contain his own markings—and the first movement is marked Allegretto, so the New Orford’s reading may be entirely justified. But something else emerges at this slightly slower tempo that I find interesting and quite delightful, and that is a sly, slightly underplayed, tongue-in-cheek humor that tickles the funny bone in a different, perhaps more sophisticated way than other, more slapstick approaches.
Take, for example, the hiccups in the cello part that come shortly into the development section following the double bar and change of key signature to one sharp. Not a few cellists take these for rude, sophomoric belches, which, admittedly, is funny, especially if you’re into high school hijinks. But Manker sees these more as little burps that slip out embarrassedly in polite company, making them all the funnier for their lack of social propriety and grace. It puts me in mind of the long-circulated tale, 1601 , attributed to Mark Twain, in which he is privy to a conversation among Francis Bacon, Sir Walter Raleigh, Ben Johnson, and 16-year-old Francis Beaumonte engaged in sniffing out who broke wind in company of the Queen. If memory serves, I think the culprit turns out to be the Queen herself. Twain, of course (whether he was the author of this particular farce or not) can always be counted on to entertain and edify and, so too, I think, can the playing of the New Orford Quartet.
FANFARE: Jerry Dubins
Shield: 6 String Quartets
Naxos
CD
$19.99
Oct 10, 2025
William Shield rose from relatively humble beginnings to become the 'house' composer to Covent Garden, for which he wrote stage works full of panache and tunefulness. He met and befriended Haydn who was to prove a lasting influence. In 1782 Shield published his Six String Quartets, Op. 3, some of the most richly rewarding works of their type in 18th-century England. The transparency of parts, use of imitation, infusion of Sturm und Drang elements as well as the bucolic and folkloric writing, all demonstrate Shield's art, as does the progressive writing of the last of the six, in C minor.
Schubert & Haydn: String Quartets / Tetzlaff Quartett
Ondine
CD
$18.99
Mar 10, 2017
In these days of megaboxes and reissues, it’s surprising and delightful to see a new release that couples two beautiful quartets, immaculately played, just because–well, just because. OK, the cover art makes Tetzlaff look like a cult leader hanging out with his three sister-wives, but happily his eponymous quartet doesn’t fall prey to any Svengali-like mind control from its first violin. Their work is that of a true quartet, well-balanced, precise, and with a welcome give-and-take between the parts.
This is particularly true of the Schubert, a work whose strange harmonies and endless tremolo textures foreshadow Bruckner, and which demand a particularly sensitive handling of the relationship between melody and accompaniment. The first movement relishes its quasi orchestral textures, but without ever letting us forget that this really is chamber music. In both of the outer movements tempos are particularly well judged, with the constant seesawing between major and minor in the finale producing a truly disturbing, almost queasy effect.
Haydn’s Quartet in G minor, Op. 20 (No. 3) makes an ideal disc mate, even leaving aside its complementary tonality. Its first movement, particularly, offers plenty of uneasy emotional ambiguity that’s very well captured here. Charles Rosen, in The Classical Style, presented a typically penetrating analysis, calling its handling of rhythm and motivic development positively upsetting; and in this interpretation the evident care with dynamics and sense of timing conveys the darkness just below the surface particularly well.
In short, this is a throwback: a classical music release without a stupid title or ridiculous concept, one that lets the greatness of the music speak for itself and offers interpretations that justify the program through purely musical means. Wonder of wonders. It deserves your support, and will reward your close attention. - ClassicsToday.com
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A MusicWeb International Recording of the Month!
Is there, I wonder, a greater string quartet than Schubert’s D.887, Beethoven’s notwithstanding? Certainly it is one of the most profound, moving and indeed disturbing works in that genre, rivalled only by the same composer’s string quintet and characterised by an eternal paradox in its typically Schubertian endless melodic stream and its equally typical sense of impending death, doom and destruction. The finale must emerge as a Dance of Death, a startlingly brutal musical depiction of dissolution almost two hundred years before Stravinsky utilised that trope in “The Rite of Spring”, a brave and desperate defiance of the inevitable masked by enforced jollity - and the Tetzlaff Quartet really nail the mood.
Their playing is swift and invariably tightly focused, never “prettified”, sometimes raw, with sparing use of vibrato, and technically flawless execution of the frequent tremolos. The recorded sound is very detailed and more intimate than, say, the Alban Berg or Allegri Quartets; their broader acoustics match their grander, more overt manner, but where the Tetztlaff really excels is in its scrupulous and invariably unanimous application of dynamics, which greatly enhances the intensity of its playing. That attention to nuance is reinforced by their observation in the booklet notes regarding how the dynamic markings go “from triple piano with diminuendo to triple forte with crescendo”. Those notes provide little factual information on the music itself, being a transcription of a conversation about its emotional hinterland and impact of this constantly questioning music. Mahler’s wry aphorism comes to mind: “If a composer could say what he had to say in words he would not bother to say it in music” – although perhaps a review should be wary of smugly borrowing his bon mot given that the same principle could apply to reviewing.
The first movement is chilling and gripping, its grotesqueries fully realised. The Andante contains some of the most beautiful and unsettling music ever written, exhibiting wonderful control of pianissimi and concluding in almost serene and consolatory mode. The Scherzo is featherlight and delicate in the Mendelssohnian manner, the waltz-time Trio ideally elegant.
If Schubert’s quartet represents some kind of apex in the form then there is an evident logic in including in the programme here a work which was seminal in its inception and establishment. However, there is also the programmatic rationale of establishing a thematic link between these two quartets. If Goethe’s dictum is correct, that the string quartet is “a conversation between four intelligent people”, then in the case of these two works all the participants are to some degree disordered, yet we undoubtedly hear four equal voices, each claiming conversational ascendancy in turn, such is the virtuosity and equilibrium of the Tetzlaffs’ playing. Haydn’s work is disturbing in a manner similar to that of Schubert’s, in that the music evinces a frequent and shocking undercurrent of dissatisfaction and even anger, although it hardly achieves the same scorched emotiveness as Schubert’s masterwork. This is wild, erratic and fragmented music by early Classical period standards; even the supposedly courtly Menuet is more melancholy and unsettled than “galant” and three of the movements conclude by simply tailing off in a piano muttering in a manner most unconventional and even unsatisfactory by the measure of the age. The Trio of the Scherzo is incongruously cheerful as if it hardly belongs in the quartet at all while the Adagio, exquisitely played here, provides another such interlude of unexpected serenity in an otherwise fitful and capricious work whose restlessness goes a long way towards justifying its kinship with D887. A final irony is that there is no evidence that this or any other string quartets were ever performed in Esterházy; it seems that Haydn wrote them out of an inner compulsion to exorcise his demons while marooned in that civilised but remote gilded cage.
Comparison with the esteemed Buchberger Quartet in the Haydn reveals that the Buchberger is more assertive and plays in a more overtly “con spirito” manner than the Tetzlaff, who are perhaps occasionally almost too refined but thereby bring out the subtleties of this extraordinary music; I would not let that count as a demerit, especially when the pairing here succeeds so triumphantly.
– MusicWeb International (Ralph Moore)
This is particularly true of the Schubert, a work whose strange harmonies and endless tremolo textures foreshadow Bruckner, and which demand a particularly sensitive handling of the relationship between melody and accompaniment. The first movement relishes its quasi orchestral textures, but without ever letting us forget that this really is chamber music. In both of the outer movements tempos are particularly well judged, with the constant seesawing between major and minor in the finale producing a truly disturbing, almost queasy effect.
Haydn’s Quartet in G minor, Op. 20 (No. 3) makes an ideal disc mate, even leaving aside its complementary tonality. Its first movement, particularly, offers plenty of uneasy emotional ambiguity that’s very well captured here. Charles Rosen, in The Classical Style, presented a typically penetrating analysis, calling its handling of rhythm and motivic development positively upsetting; and in this interpretation the evident care with dynamics and sense of timing conveys the darkness just below the surface particularly well.
In short, this is a throwback: a classical music release without a stupid title or ridiculous concept, one that lets the greatness of the music speak for itself and offers interpretations that justify the program through purely musical means. Wonder of wonders. It deserves your support, and will reward your close attention. - ClassicsToday.com
-
A MusicWeb International Recording of the Month!
Is there, I wonder, a greater string quartet than Schubert’s D.887, Beethoven’s notwithstanding? Certainly it is one of the most profound, moving and indeed disturbing works in that genre, rivalled only by the same composer’s string quintet and characterised by an eternal paradox in its typically Schubertian endless melodic stream and its equally typical sense of impending death, doom and destruction. The finale must emerge as a Dance of Death, a startlingly brutal musical depiction of dissolution almost two hundred years before Stravinsky utilised that trope in “The Rite of Spring”, a brave and desperate defiance of the inevitable masked by enforced jollity - and the Tetzlaff Quartet really nail the mood.
Their playing is swift and invariably tightly focused, never “prettified”, sometimes raw, with sparing use of vibrato, and technically flawless execution of the frequent tremolos. The recorded sound is very detailed and more intimate than, say, the Alban Berg or Allegri Quartets; their broader acoustics match their grander, more overt manner, but where the Tetztlaff really excels is in its scrupulous and invariably unanimous application of dynamics, which greatly enhances the intensity of its playing. That attention to nuance is reinforced by their observation in the booklet notes regarding how the dynamic markings go “from triple piano with diminuendo to triple forte with crescendo”. Those notes provide little factual information on the music itself, being a transcription of a conversation about its emotional hinterland and impact of this constantly questioning music. Mahler’s wry aphorism comes to mind: “If a composer could say what he had to say in words he would not bother to say it in music” – although perhaps a review should be wary of smugly borrowing his bon mot given that the same principle could apply to reviewing.
The first movement is chilling and gripping, its grotesqueries fully realised. The Andante contains some of the most beautiful and unsettling music ever written, exhibiting wonderful control of pianissimi and concluding in almost serene and consolatory mode. The Scherzo is featherlight and delicate in the Mendelssohnian manner, the waltz-time Trio ideally elegant.
If Schubert’s quartet represents some kind of apex in the form then there is an evident logic in including in the programme here a work which was seminal in its inception and establishment. However, there is also the programmatic rationale of establishing a thematic link between these two quartets. If Goethe’s dictum is correct, that the string quartet is “a conversation between four intelligent people”, then in the case of these two works all the participants are to some degree disordered, yet we undoubtedly hear four equal voices, each claiming conversational ascendancy in turn, such is the virtuosity and equilibrium of the Tetzlaffs’ playing. Haydn’s work is disturbing in a manner similar to that of Schubert’s, in that the music evinces a frequent and shocking undercurrent of dissatisfaction and even anger, although it hardly achieves the same scorched emotiveness as Schubert’s masterwork. This is wild, erratic and fragmented music by early Classical period standards; even the supposedly courtly Menuet is more melancholy and unsettled than “galant” and three of the movements conclude by simply tailing off in a piano muttering in a manner most unconventional and even unsatisfactory by the measure of the age. The Trio of the Scherzo is incongruously cheerful as if it hardly belongs in the quartet at all while the Adagio, exquisitely played here, provides another such interlude of unexpected serenity in an otherwise fitful and capricious work whose restlessness goes a long way towards justifying its kinship with D887. A final irony is that there is no evidence that this or any other string quartets were ever performed in Esterházy; it seems that Haydn wrote them out of an inner compulsion to exorcise his demons while marooned in that civilised but remote gilded cage.
Comparison with the esteemed Buchberger Quartet in the Haydn reveals that the Buchberger is more assertive and plays in a more overtly “con spirito” manner than the Tetzlaff, who are perhaps occasionally almost too refined but thereby bring out the subtleties of this extraordinary music; I would not let that count as a demerit, especially when the pairing here succeeds so triumphantly.
– MusicWeb International (Ralph Moore)
Haydn: String Quartets, Op. 50, No. 2, 3, 6 / Leipzig String Quartet
MDG
CD
$23.99
May 01, 2015
The Leipzig String Quartet continues its Haydn edition with three more works from his op. 50, and once again the members magnificently succeed in combining classical perfection with surprisingly fresh esprit.
For more than twenty years the Leipzig String Quartet has been playing in the Champions League of chamber music. Showered with prizes and awards, this world-class ensemble again and again has azzled listening audiences with their sensational recordings and concerts.
For more than twenty years the Leipzig String Quartet has been playing in the Champions League of chamber music. Showered with prizes and awards, this world-class ensemble again and again has azzled listening audiences with their sensational recordings and concerts.
Ginastera: String Quartet No 1, 2 & 3 / Enso Quartet
Naxos
CD
$19.99
Jun 30, 2009
GINASTERA String Quartets: No. 1; No. 2; No. 3 1 • Ens? Qrt; Lucy Shelton (sop) 1 • NAXOS 8.570780 (73:31 Text and Translation)
More than most, Ginastera’s compositional output may be divided into three stylistic periods. His early works, using an impressionist language, were nationalistic in influence and drew heavily on Argentine dance rhythms. During his middle period, he expanded the scope of his tonality while remaining attached to his Hispanic roots, and in his late works he turned to contemporary avant-garde idioms. In my view, his best work comes from the middle period: the brilliant Harp Concerto and the succinct Variaciones concertantes. He was more individual than in his early impressionistic mode, and paradoxically more individual than he was to become after he adopted the standard stylistic traits of the 1960s and 1970s. His first two string quartets date from the beginning and end of that middle period.
Ginastera’s quartets demand a high level of virtuosity from the performers. Extreme dynamics, high harmonics, and syncopated rhythms requiring tight ensemble appear throughout. The First Quartet of 1948 is notable for its light-footed Scherzo ( vivacissimo ), its atmospheric slow movement ( calmo e poetico ), and a vigorous, stamping finale ( allegramente rustico ).
A similar wispy Scherzo movement occurs in the Second Quartet (1958, rev. 1968), but there it is deconstructed. In five movements, the Second Quartet contains an “extra” movement built from a series of cadenzas from each of the instruments ( libero e rapsodico ), before plunging into its own modernized version of a dance-inflected finale. The first movement presents a 12-tone theme, the first use of that technique in the composer’s work.
By the time of the Third Quartet, Ginastera had left his previous formal procedures behind. He introduced a soprano soloist, as did Schoenberg in his Second Quartet—a precedent of which the status-conscious Argentine composer was well aware. He set texts by Jiménez, Lorca, and Alberti, illuminating the soprano’s vocalizing and occasional spoken declamation with a series of ingenious string effects. The imagery and atmosphere of the poems dictate the musical form, so the task for the musicians is to reproduce specific moods, on top of the considerable technical challenges.
Previous recordings of all three quartets exist, though only one currently available brings them together on a single CD: the Cuarteto Latinoamericano (on Élan). I have not heard that disc, but I have the Latinoamericano recording of Quartet No. 1 in a mixed program from the same label (which may or may not be the same performance): they bring genuine excitement and tight ensemble to the piece, but are equally matched by the Ens? on this new release.
The original performers of the Third Quartet, Benita Valente and the Juilliard Quartet, recorded the work for the Bridge label in an interesting mixed recital that is well worth hearing for the couplings by Harbison and Wernick. Valente sings with great control and understanding, but the recording was made some 27 years after the event, by which time her voice had lost much of its bloom.
On the new disc, Lucy Shelton is a revelation: she brings pure tone and a wide range of vocal color to her interpretation. (Valente is more convincing in the relatively few spoken passages.) The U.S.-based Ens? Quartet plays with warmth and unanimity, meeting all the technical and interpretive hurdles with apparent ease. Naxos’s sound is excellent, the timing is generous, and a translation of the poetry is provided, making this CD the version of choice, regardless of price.
FANFARE: Phillip Scott
Rubinstein: String Quartets Nos. 4 & 6 / Reinhold Quartett
CPO
CD
$18.99
Jan 08, 2021
How Anton Rubinstein in the end succeeded in creating a comprehensive oeuvre covering all the genres while making breathtaking concert and traveling rounds as a pianist is something that numbers among the incomprehensibilities of his life marked by a tireless work ethos. During the course of his busy life on the go he composed more than a dozen operas, six symphonies, an oratorio, a ballet, some two hundred songs, countless works for piano solo and for piano in the concerto style and with orchestral accompaniment, and chamber music for various formations with and without piano. He also composed ten string quartets, two of which are now being released on cpo. Rubinstein composed these works during his time in Leipzig, and the Reinhold Quartet, whose members are musicians of the Gewandhaus Orchestra in Leipzig, offer powerful interpretations of them. The two Quartets Nos. 1 and 3 in minor keys from op. 47 are on the one hand subtly linked together motivically and on the other hand most highly different in design. Especially striking triplet motifs livening up in the secondary segments, refined motivic transformations, and fortissimo outbursts of absolutely orchestral might – these are all typical characteristics of Rubinstein’s quartet style. And what might possibly top the impressive conclusion of the first quartet? The gigantic, virtuosic, and harmonically and formally bolder conclusion of the third quartet, that’s what!
Stanford: String Quartets Nos. 1, 2, & 6 / Dante Quartet
SOMM Recordings
CD
$20.99
Jan 17, 2020
SOMM Recordings’ historic complete survey of Charles Villiers Stanford’s String Quartets by the Dante Quartet reaches its end with a third volume focusing on Nos. 1 and 2, and the first recording of No. 6. Already acclaimed as a composer of choral music, Stanford came relatively late to the string quartet form, composing his first two at the age of 39 in 1891. Six more followed over the next three decades, including the Op. 122 String Quartet, No. 6 in 1910. This final volume features the early String Quartets, Opp. 44 (No. 1) and 45 (No. 2) which share a concern for meticulous use of individual instrument voices and a leaning towards lyricism. Allusions to Beethoven and Mozart are contained within Stanford’s own beautifully crafted music. Heard here in its premiere recording, the Sixth String Quartet is a work of rich contrasts, restless energy and some of Stanford’s most expressive writing for the medium. Volume I (SOMMCD 0160) was admired as “an excellent disc in every respect” (MusicWeb International), applauded as “most enterprising and thoroughly likeable” (Classical Ear) and acclaimed “a really worthwhile release” (Gramophone). Volume II (SOMMCD 0185) was described as “essential listening... SOMM and the Dantes have broken important new ground with impressive commitment” by Gramophone and by Limelight as being “played with great élan and sensitivity by the excellent Dante Quartet”.
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REVIEW:
The Dante Quartet play splendidly throughout the album, with noticeably clean articulation and gratifying intonation. Unerringly accomplished, these Dante performances, combined with spirited interpretations that breathe vitality and enthusiasm, would pass the most rigorous examination. The engineering team, recording in St Nicholas Parish Church, Thames Ditton, has provided first class sound quality. Stanford biographer Jeremy Dibble has written the booklet notes. Lovers of British music, and Stanford in particular, need not hesitate in acquiring this superb album.
– MusicWeb International
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REVIEW:
The Dante Quartet play splendidly throughout the album, with noticeably clean articulation and gratifying intonation. Unerringly accomplished, these Dante performances, combined with spirited interpretations that breathe vitality and enthusiasm, would pass the most rigorous examination. The engineering team, recording in St Nicholas Parish Church, Thames Ditton, has provided first class sound quality. Stanford biographer Jeremy Dibble has written the booklet notes. Lovers of British music, and Stanford in particular, need not hesitate in acquiring this superb album.
– MusicWeb International
Beethoven: The Late String Quartets / Cypress String Quartet
Avie Records
CD
$38.99
May 01, 2016
The Cypress String Quartet completes their cycle of the genre’s greatest oeuvre with a two-album set of Beethoven’s six ground-breaking quartets, Op. 18, alongside a reissue of their previously self-released recording of the late quartets. For the past several seasons, the Cypresses have immersed themselves in performing Beethoven on tours throughout the U.S. and Europe as well as recording all 16 works plus the “Grande Fugue” (Große Fuge). The completion of their Beethoven cycle is a fitting celebration of the Bay Area-based ensemble’s 20th anniversary, as well as their valedictory season.
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REVIEW:
The Cypress Quartet’s Beethoven readings have numerous virtues. The interpretations are well thought through, and the group’s beauty of tone and unanimity of ensemble are unfailing.
– MusicWeb International
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REVIEW:
The Cypress Quartet’s Beethoven readings have numerous virtues. The interpretations are well thought through, and the group’s beauty of tone and unanimity of ensemble are unfailing.
– MusicWeb International
Bartok & Kodaly: The Complete String Quartets
Foghorn Classics
CD
$37.99
Jan 01, 2013
BARTÓK String Quartets No. 1–6. KODÁLY String Quartets Nos. 1 and 2 • Alexander Str Qrt • FOGHORN 2009 (3 CDs: 205:55)
This fascinating set combines the string quartets of two then-young professors of music in Hungary, Béla Bartók and Zoltan Kodály. It’s an interesting set even though Bartók wrote a half-dozen quartets, which have since become staples of string quartets around the world, whereas Kodály only wrote two which are not as frequently programmed. Nor are the Kodály quartets as frequently recorded: ArkivMusic lists only one other recording of the First Quartet, by the Kontra Quartet (BIS 564), and only seven other recordings of Kodály’s No. 2, of which three are historical performances (the Végh Quartet, 1951, on Orfeo 316931; the Hungarian Quartet, 1952, on Music & Arts; and the Hollywood String Quartet, 1958, on Testament). Bartók beat Kodály to his First Quartet by a matter of months, the premiere occurring on January 27, 1909. Both composers worked on their second quartets during the harsh period of the First World War, and both works also had their premieres in 1918. For whatever reason, Kodály stopped at this point, whereas Bartók wrote four more quartets.
Comparing the Emerson Quartet’s performances of the First and Third Bartók quartets to the Alexander’s (I really didn’t have time to do the entire set, but these two quartets provide a good basis, the First being from Bartók’s earlier period and the Third coming from 1927), I found interesting if subtle points of comparison. But my Fanfare colleague Art Lange, upon reviewing the Emerson set when it was reissued in 2007, went even further back, comparing it to the performances of the Hungarian Quartet, and noted the earlier group’s “looser, albeit dramatic approach” in which the Hungarians “take a few liberties with pauses and tempos” and “have a better feel for the folk elements,” though—and I stress this—the earlier group tended to lessen “the accumulated tension” and “exaggerate more of the mysterious and atmospheric passages.” This trend, then, is simply turned up a notch in intensity and continuity by the Alexander, bringing us a tad further forward from the folk style that Bartók used.
With the Third Quartet, Bartók’s most astringent, compact, and dense work of the six, the style of playing is virtually identical in the case of both the Emerson and the Alexander: sonorities are lean, attacks are sharp, and the musical contours angular. There aren’t many interpretive options in this particular piece. But in the First Quartet (as well as in the first movement of the Second, which I also compared), there are decided differences in approach and style. The Emerson employs particularly broad tempos in the opening movement of the First Quartet, taking a leisurely 9:16 compared to the Alexander’s 8: 30. There is also greater warmth in the Emerson’s sound: whether this is a condition of their actual timbres or simply advantageous microphone placement, I don’t know. Of course, the leaner, brighter quality of the Alexander’s recording is entirely appropriate to modern music, particularly the modern music that emerged after Bartók’s death, and even within the context of these six quartets their performances set a very high standard.
As an example, I felt that the Alexander’s performance of the First Quartet’s opening movement, though less leisurely in feeling, has a tensile quality that immerses the listener in Bartók’s unique sound world and holds your attention. It is almost as if the Alexander’s players had the entire score in their heads, could “see” the music progressing as one continuous flow from first note to last, and thus propelled it into the ether for the benefit of the microphones. They do not, thankfully, play mechanically, the music being produced with almost explosive energy and drama. Yet if one goes by timings, the evidence is not always in the Emerson’s favor. The Alexander nearly always takes the fast movements just as fast if not faster than the Emerson, whereas their slow movements are generally (but not always) more relaxed, an exception being the Lento Finale of the Second Quartet, which the Emerson explores in 9:18 while the Alexander gets it done in 7: 38. As I say, tempos do not always indicate phrasing, but a performance nearly two minutes shorter simply has to be taken faster. What’s interesting, however, is that by and large the Alexander’s performance only sounds a little faster, and once again it ties this movement into the overall fabric—the continuity—of the Quartet as a whole.
The Alexander also finds moments of repose within their forward momentum; it’s just that their moments of repose are subtler, less easily discernible as pauses in the music (comparing it to literature, one might say commas in the musical sentences). To a large extent, Bartók’s six quartets are the 20th-century equivalent of Beethoven’s late quartets, and one can most certainly make a generalization between the way earlier string quartets such as the Rosé played them—with a certain amount of gemütlich, more portamento than we are used to today, and more astringent string tone due to the musicians’ more frequent (but not constant) use of straight tone—and the way we’ve come to hear them since the days of the Budapest Quartet, surely the first “modern” string quartet in terms of tautness and ensemble virtuosity, and the Yale Quartet, whose 1961 recordings of these thorny works set new standards. We simply can’t go back to the Rosé Quartet and hear their performances of Beethoven as being within our conception of the music; yet both as a quartet leader and as concertmaster of the Vienna Philharmonic, Arnold Rosé’s artistry and integrity as a musician was utterly beyond question.
I mention this in connection to these performances because it is not only an interesting artistic topic, but also valid in evaluating the evolution of musical performances in the 20th century and beyond. Bartók’s Fourth Quartet, composed in 1928, was in fact dedicated to the Pro Arte Quartet. I daresay that only diehard collectors of vintage performances will be familiar with Pro Arte’s style (they recorded an extensive series of Haydn quartets for HMV in the 1930s, a project ended by the onset of war, and also performed frequently both on and off records with pianist Artur Schnabel), but they were somewhere between the Rosé and the Budapest Quartets. There is a more consistent vibrato, fine and rapid but still discernible, in their playing than in the case of the Rosé, but also a slightly more relaxed rhythmic feel, a bit more give-and-take, than we hear in the playing of the Budapest and the many quartets that followed them. (I should point out that I heard the Hungarian Quartet in person playing Beethoven in 1970, but this was a later edition of this famous group and their style, too, had evolved into a more consistent forward momentum by then, not like their style of the 1950s.)
Checking on the artists’ own website (foghornclassics.com), I was startled to read in a review by Lisa Hirsch of the San Francisco Classical Voice that the Alexander’s live performance of one of the Bartók quartets was “introverted,” without “neglecting the work’s varying moods.” Introverted is not a word I’d apply to these explosive performances. They are indeed fantastic, although I would caution that Bartók’s continual intensity, as well as the extraordinarily dense harmonies and counterpoint, make listening to all six quartets in one sitting a tough go. I would suggest hearing two quartets at a time, separated by either periods of silence or less challenging music. Listening to even three of these works in one session is rather like listening to a full 70-minute CD of Art Tatum. The concentrated complexity of the music that unfolds can tire even a seasoned listener like myself out.
Then we turn to the Kodály quartets, less familiar works surely (this was the first time I had ever heard them), but once again we can make certain generalizations regarding the Alexander’s performances of them as based on the details and style one hears in their Bartók. Even the earlier Quartet No. 1 is given a taut, clean reading, bringing it close in style to Bartók’s own work. Of course, Kodály was his own man: although he assisted Bartók in recording and cataloguing Magyar folk melodies, and used some of their features in his own work, he was more consistent in writing longer, less sharply angular melodies. In short, Kodály’s music sings more, a factor that surely attracted more conductors of his time to perform his music during the 1920s and 1930s than was often Bartók’s fate. In this respect, Kodály’s quartets are a bit closer in general conception (but not exact details) to Janá?ek, whose quartets actually “sing” more than his operas. Listen particularly to the slow movements here: Kodály’s music, and the Alexander’s playing of it, are exceptionally lovely and moving in addition to being musically clean. Once again, as in their Bartók, the Alexander has found a way of bringing out the music’s tender side when tenderness is called for—which is more frequently in these Kodály works.
The list price of this set is $29.96, which breaks down to $9.93 per CD, a very reasonable price in this modern era, but the Alexander’s website indicates that Allegro Music is selling the set for $23.97 (which you can order directly from them), which breaks down to $7.99 per disc, bringing it into line with a budget label such as Naxos. I still like the Emerson’s recordings of the Bartók, but as a total package this one is irresistible. If you’ve put off buying a set of the Bartók quartets until now, and/or don’t have any recordings of the Kodály, you can’t go wrong with this collection. It is, quite simply, terrific.
FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley
Berg: String Quartet, Lyric Suite; Wolf: Italian Serenade
Naxos
CD
$19.99
Jun 26, 2007
Perhaps it's the passage of time, or it's simply the New Zealand String Quartet's embracing, unselfconscious style and illuminating technique, but the atonal sounds of Alban Berg's String Quartet Op. 3 sure seem a lot closer to late-19th century romanticism than they did 40 or so years ago when listeners in my generation first paid attention to Berg's music. And since the work was written almost 100 years ago, that's as it should be, as is the fact that it's now much easier to get past the larger and still-challenging sonic picture to appreciate the inner textural and motivic details.
Of course, our ability to really hear and follow what's going on depends on the performance--and these four musicians may be the best on disc (surpassing the Leipzig and Pražák quartets) in all-important matters of linear clarity, dynamic shading, and sustaining the developmental tension throughout Op. 3's two long, difficult movements. In the Lyric Suite, ensemble unanimity and precision in the increasingly fast odd-numbered movements is critical, and the New Zealanders not only accomplish this but also never forget the intrinsic drama and emotional intensity that haunts this music, especially impressive in the Allegro misterioso and Adagio appassionato movements at the heart of the work.
Indeed, as you listen to these works afresh, you not only marvel at the individual players' virtuosity, but you also have to appreciate that the relatively warm yet pleasingly "edgy" quality to the sound and the oneness of spirit in the interpretations come from the highest-order functioning of the well-integrated collective parts of a mature, vital body--that is, a string quartet that's been together a long time, each member sharing life and breath in the music they make together. This is one reason we listen to the great string quartets--and besides the chance to hear Berg's fascinating and formidable scores again, that's the reason you shouldn't miss this extraordinary recording.
--David Vernier, ClassicsToday.com
Heise: The String Quartets, Vol. 1 / Nordic String Quartet
Dacapo Classical
CD
$8.99
$17.99
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Jun 09, 2023
Between 1851 and 1857, Peter Heise wrote six string quartets for the intimate musical soirées of Copenhagen’s refined middle class. Heise was a celebrated and cherished composer in his native Denmark, but his quartets sadly fell into obscurity and were stored away. The Nordic String Quartet is reviving these works with this first volume of their complete collection, featuring Quartets Nos. 1–3.
BRAHMS: PIANO QUARTETS 2 & 3
UNIVERSAL JAPAN
CD
$26.99
Apr 11, 2025
Master pianist Christian Zimmermann joins young string players as collaborators on this Brahms chamber music album. The recording features Polish violinist Maria Nowak, violist Katarzyna Budnik-Garadzka, and Japanese cellist Yuya Okamoto. [Performers] Christian Zimmermann (piano), Maria Nowak (violin), Katarzyna Budnik (viola), Yuya Okamoto (cello) Recorded: June 2021, April 2023 Switzerland *This product will be available for purchase on Friday, and will be delivered after the day of release.
BEETHOVEN: COMPLETE STRING QUARTETS
ELOQUENCE AUSTRALIA
CD
$64.57
Aug 13, 2021
Limited Edition 10CD box set. The Lindsay String Quartet's award-winning and first Beethoven cycle (1979-83), originally recorded for ASV: risk-taking musicianship at the highest level. 'We had spent more time on rehearsing and trying to understand Beethoven than any other composer: he was a God to us,' writes cellist Bernard Gregor-Smith. Through the course of their 40-year career, the Lindsay String Quartet was synonymous above all with the string quartets of Beethoven. They began playing together in 1966 while still students at the Royal Academy of Music in London. Six years later, Ronald Birks took the second violin chair to join leader Peter Cropper, violist Roger Bigley and cellist Bernard Gregor-Smith. As the quartet in residence at the universities of Sheffield and Manchester, they began to scale the monuments of the repertoire, and they developed a collective identity - 'the Lindsays' sound' - which became much better known once they started to record the quartets of Beethoven for the Enigma label in the late 1970s. Opp 74 and then the six Op 18 quartets were released as analogue LPs before the Lindsays moved to the ASV label and recorded the rest of the cycle with new digital technology. Instantly recognisable even now and quite distinct from the ensembles of note who came before and after them, the Lindsays always sounded like a quartet of four discrete and entirely individual personalities. They soon became celebrated for a fierce, even ferocious commitment to both the notes on the page (taking Beethoven's repeat marks seriously when it was still unfashionable to do so) and to the sometimes rough, often tough and yet elevated spirit of music that still sets a benchmark for both ensembles and listeners. The Lindsays left nothing in the rehearsal studio, even when the red light was on. Already in this first cycle, the Lindsays take chances, stress the forward-looking nature of Beethoven's writing, and put interpretation ahead of finesse. When the late quartets were released together, they won the 1984 Gramophone Chamber Award. The ensemble re-recorded the entire cycle for ASV in the 1990s: the Lindsays sound remained the same while the interpretations evolved over the decades, becoming not objectively better but different. Parts of the first cycle such as Op. 131 go to greater extremes of tempo and dynamic in search of Beethoven's elusive truth: the opening fugue almost hangs in mid-air. Yet there is no shortage of fire in the belly of the C minor Op. 18 No. 4 or grace and wit in the 'Razumovsky' scherzos. This landmark set in Beethoven interpretation is reissued by Eloquence with a new booklet essay by Tully Potter, exploring the place of the Lindsays within the context of the great string quartets.
Bowen: String Quartets No 2 & 3 / Archaeus Quartet
Naxos
CD
$9.99
$19.99
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Aug 12, 2014
Described by Saint-Saëns as "the most remarkable of the young British composers," York Bowen was widely known as a pianist and as a composer, his fame reaching its zenith in the years immediately preceding the First World War. The writer and composer Thomas Dunhill described Bowen’s chamber music as "an essentially healthy and breezy phase in modern art." This is especially true of the 1922 Carnegie Trust Award-winning Second Quartet, and while both quartets are based on clear-cut classical models the Third is more elusive and intimate in feeling, revealing the composer’s rarely displayed private side. The atmospheric Phantasy-Quintet provides a rare opportunity to hear the beauty of the bass clarinet in a truly eloquent and expressive soloist capacity.
Weinberg: String Quartets, Vol. 5
Chandos
CD
$21.99
Apr 25, 2025
The Arcadia Quartet reaches the penultimate release in it's acclaimed complete Weinberg string quartets series with this volume, featuring Quartets Nos 3, 9, and 14. As in previous volumes, the works are taken from contrasting periods of Weinberg's compositional development, and so present a varied programme that works in it's own right. Quartet No. 3, composed in 1944, could be considered as the first 'mature' quartet, and is set in three movements. The Ninth Quartet, composed in 1963, dates from his self-described 'starry decade', when his work was championed by a significant group of enthusiastic performers, including Emil Gilels, Leonid Kogan, Kirill Kondrashin, Rudolf Barshai, and the Borodin Quartet. Quartet No. 14 dates from 1978, three years after the death of Weinberg's great friend and mentor Shostakovich: a time when Weinberg was questioning and renewing his artistic identity. The album also includes the short Improvisation and Romance, from 1950.
Haydn: String Quartets Op 74 / Kodaly Quartet
Naxos
CD
$19.99
Apr 01, 1990
"The Naxos recordings by the Kodaly Quartet are outstanding in every way and would be highly recommendable even without their considerable price advantage. The digital recording has vivid presence and just the right amount of ambience: the effect is entirely natural."
-- Penguin Guide [2003/4 Edition]
-- Penguin Guide [2003/4 Edition]
Beethoven: Sonatas & Overtures Arr String Quartet
MDG
CD
$23.99
Aug 17, 2018
Beethoven’s Piano Sonata op. 106, the “Hammerklavier Sonata,” is regarded as the most complex and demanding piece among the complex and demanding works from his late period. It was not until Franz Liszt, decades after Beethoven’s death, that a pianist was able to master this sonata’s madcap technical challenges. The version for string quartet prepared by David Plylar, a curator at the Library of Congress, was initially intended as a guide through the structural thicket of this gigantic opus. In this rendering by the Leipzig String Quartet, however, it also turns out to be an extremely revealing expansion of our musical horizons. The extended polyphonic passages quite naturally profit from the new opportunities offered by ensemble playing: the canon at the beginning of the development section in the first movement or the mighty fugue in the finale. Beethoven calls for the use of all eighty-eight piano keys, which at the time was a sensational demand. The extreme registers are also represented in the quartet version. Only a top ensemble like the Leipzig String Quartet has the magic and mastery it takes to bring its gigantic leaps, flageolet chords, and intricate harmonic relations to the concert stage. Two transcriptions by Beethoven’s contemporary enrich the program. Along with the Gewandhaus violist Peter Michael Borck, the quartet members present Beethoven’s third attempt to write an overture for his opera Leonore. At the very latest when Borck reaches for the famous offstage trumpet, the last skeptic will become a firm believer in the quintet’s symphonic qualities. The considerably trimmer final version of the Fidelio overture impressively rounds off this extraordinary project.
Beethoven: Complete String Quartets, Vol. 8
Audite Musikproduktion
CD
$21.99
Oct 06, 2017
The Quartetto di Cremona has spent over three years working on its recording series comprising all twenty string quartets as well as the two string quintets by Ludwig van Beethoven - a gigantic project which most ensembles tackle at a more advanced age. However, the Quartetto di Cremona, founded in 2000, wanted to experience it sooner. The audite Beethoven cycle, with itsexciting blend of spirit, precision and sense of sound - the Quartetto diCremona's trademark - has its finger on the pulse: the success was so immediatethat, following the first volumes, concert halls across Europe and the USinvited the ensemble to perform: in many quarters their recordings enjoyreference status. Thanks to studying Beethoven so thoroughly, the ensemble'sbroad repertoire has gained a new level of intensity and their playing culturehas been honed even further, both in terms of detailed expression and ofoverarching gestures and contours. The final volume of the edition opens withthe third of the Op. 18 Quartets with which Beethoven introduced himself as acomposer in 1800 - six quartets which indeed all tell their own "story". Fromthe tentative beginning, cautiously drawing the listener in,through to the tempestuous concluding tarantella, every bar of the Quartet in Dmajor is replete and carefully considered. Beethoven's debut quartet is contrastedwith the so-called "Harp Quartet" Op. 74, featuring yet another formalsolution. A cunningly conceived first movement with prominent plucked "harpnotes" is answered by the finale, where Beethoven reuses a (discarded) numberfrom his incidental music to Goethe's freedom drama Egmont as a theme and variations - a clear indication of the factthat the composer, in 1809, at the time of the Napoleonic Wars, lived throughpolitically precarious times.
