Composers String Quartet - String - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

The Emerson String Quartet makes it PENTATONE debut with a recording of Schumann's three string quartets. Penned in the summer of 1842 during an exceptional peak of creativity, these quartets formed the beginning of a six-month surge during which most of Schumann's best chamber music saw the light. Inspired by the example of Beethoven, Schumann's quartets display a mastery of traditional forms, combined with typically Schumannian fantasy and lyricism, particularly in the inner movements. As such, they underline a new level of maturity in Schumann's artistic development, surpassing the fantastical aesthetic of previous years. The players of the Emerson String Quartet lift out the extraordinary freshness and originality of these works, and add another master composer's quartet oeuvre to their impressive discography, after having recorded the complete string quartets of Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Bartók, Webern and Shostakovich. The artistic strength of Schumann, whose life was dominated by alternating periods of depression and manic creativity, inspires and consoles the quartet members during the uncertain times of a pandemic, and his music may equally inspire listeners. Since it's foundation in 1976, the Emerson String Quartet is ranked among the world's most acclaimed chamber music ensembles. Album Tracks 1. String Quartet No.1 in a Minor, Op.41/1 2. String Quartet No.2 in F Major, Op.41/2 3. String Quartet No.3 in a Major, Op.41/3

Album Tracks 1. Rubato, Quasi Recitativo - Basel String Quartet 2. Andante - Basel String Quartet 3. Vivo - Basel String Quartet 4. Allegro - Basel String Quartet 5. Andante - Basel String Quartet 6. Presto - Basel String Quartet 7. Le Cadenze - Basel String Quartet/Hungarian Symphony Orchestra 8. Gli Ornamenti - Basel String Quartet/Hungarian Symphony Orchestra 9. Le Fanfare - Basel String Quartet/Hungarian Symphony Orchestra

Our first collaborative venture with the Constanze Quartet from Salzburg also marks the production of the first complete recording of the string quartets of Felix Draeseke - a German composer, a representative of the new German school, and a contemporary of Franz Liszt, Richard Wagner, and Johannes Brahms. Draeseke's string quartets are unique in style. In them we often encounter influence from Wagner, even if not in the form of an imitation of Wagnerian compositional style but as a creative continuation of the legacy of Classical composers such as they were transmitted to Draeseke through Wagner. The idea of a Inchmelodic threadInch holding the music together while serving as a unifying element is in evidence everywhere in these works. Both quartets impressively demonstrate the words of the Draeseke expert Christoph Schlüren InchDraeseke is primarily lyrical in nature but at the same time has his appealing harshness and explores the dark, introverted expressive worlds with a unique imagination. The far-reaching melos is tailored for contrapuntal suitability, and for German circumstances the rhythm is particularly zestful and highly varied. Stylistically, relations quite obviously exist not only between Draeseke and Beethoven but also between Draeseke and Mendelssohn inasmuch as Draeseke's highly colorful harmonic language, in part pervaded by surprising modulations, is an individual continuation and development of the New German InchprogressiveInch stance proceeding from Wagner and Liszt. Draeseke's outstanding stature as a string quartet composer rests above all on his entirely original architectonic mastery in a genre in which Beethoven and Schubert created unsurpassable music, but where Draeseke, together with Brahms, Tchaikovsky, and the late Dvorák, proceeding from the experiences of Schumann and Mendelssohn, produced decidedly new music.Inch Album Tracks