About This Item
Beethoven's 16 string quartets occupy a place of honour in the chamber repertoire and, like his nine symphonies and 32 piano sonatas, trace his progression through his creative life. 2020 marks the 250th anniversary of the composer's birth, and Quatuor Ébène is recognising this with an extensive tour, entitled Beethoven Around the World, which runs from Spring 2019 to December 2020. Over that period the French ensemble will give over 120 concerts in a total of 21 countries on six continents, focusing on complete cycles of the quartets from February 2020. Beethoven Around the World encompasses live recordings for Erato, building a complete cycle, made in seven of the world's great cities Vienna (at the Konzerthaus); Philadelphia (Kimmel Center); Tokyo (Suntory Hall); São Paulo (Sala São Paulo); Melbourne (Melbourne Recital Centre); Nairobi, and, with the support of UNESCO, Paris (Philharmonie de Paris). Speaking of the ongoing tour, the members of Quatuor Ébène say InchThis is where Beethoven goes global. The quartets are 16 masterpieces that form an eternally modern artistic canon of unparalleled breadth and depth - they translate the purest humanity into music. In themselves they represent an odyssey, a round-the-world voyage.Inch The players believe that the composer's music Inchtranscends all linguistic, geographical and political borders... Both modern and timeless, it is universal. It cannot be readily classified as Classical or Romantic, as German, or even as Western, but it is music that expresses itself freely and which addresses the audiences of the future rather than it's own time... It can seem complex at first, but everything becomes clear as it's essence emerges.Inch The ensemble also emphasises that InchThe quartet as a genre gives individual players the chance to shine, yet is simultaneously predicated on collaboration and Concord it shows democracy
