Friedrich Ernst FESCA (1789-1826)
Complete String Quartets - Volume 2
String Quartet Op 2 No 1 in B minor [27.05]
String Quartet Op 2 No 2 in G minor [22.50]
String Quartet Op 2 No 3 in E-flat major [24.16]
String Quartet in F minor Op 7 No 1 [32.29]
String Quartet in E minor Op 7 No 2 [31.37]
String Quartet in B-flat major Op 14 [39:00]
String Quartet Op 4 in C minor [28.05]
String Quartet Op 36 in C major [27.23]
Amaryllis Quartet
rec. 2007-13, SWR Stuttgart, Kammermusikstudio
CPO 777 483-2 [4 CDs: 233.42]
I feel that in reviewing this set of four discs I am landing somewhere in the middle of a novel; not only had I not heard music by Fesca before, but I had not even heard of the composer until the CD landed heavily on the doormat.
Fesca's output includes symphonies, concertante works, songs and sacred works as well as sixteen string quartets and four string quintets. This set of discs holds eight quartets the previous volume holds the quartets of Opus 1, Opus 3 and Opus 34. They were all published between 1815 and 1826. Fesca suffered with a lung ailment, which was to kill him before, I suspect, he had fully developed his musical character. Still, what we have is a vast output to explore and CPO, by starting with the chamber music, have ‘homed’ in on what his contemporaries would have considered his major strength.
I decided to listen to these quartets in numerical order beginning therefore with the Opus 2. The booklet annotator Bert Hagels writes ‘If, in these works of Op 2, the first is something akin to a presentation of the current ‘state of the art’, and the second an archaising backward glance at obsolescent movement types and procedures”, the third….”forms a cheerful and unproblematic conclusion to the entire set”. Or to put it another way, I strongly felt the melancholy elegance of Op 2
No 2 (G minor) especially in the second movement marked Poco Adagio, to be less Mendelssohn and more Schumann, and also in the Op 2
No1 (B minor) with the finale a stand out movement, but in Op 2 No 3 the easy grace of Haydn was prevalent, as the composer willingly admitted, it seems, that the great classical composers were his guides. That would also have included figures now rather overlooked like Ferdinand Ries (1784-1838) and Andreas Romberg (1767-1838) who were very popular during Fesca’s lifetime.
Fesca’s consistent approach not only in the Op 2 but also in all of the quartets is to write a four-movement work with an Andante second movement, and a Minuetto third movement. The first movement would be a sonata form, as might the finale, which could also be in rondo form. Occasionally something odd happens, as with the angry outbursts in the Minuetto of Quartet
No 3; did Fesca know his Beethoven?
The two Opus 7 Quartets in F minor and E minor show an even greater maturity and a more fully-fledged personality. They are longer by up to a third but still fall into the same formal patterns. Fesca’s ability to compose long, lyrical lines is especially pertinent in the slow movements and both works are imbued with a deep sense of melencholy in a Mendlessohnian sort of way, but also sometimes a quirkiness as in the finale of
Op 7 No 1. There is also a deep wistfulness also about the Op 7
No 2 in E minor and also a sense of drama, especially in the opening ideas. The slow movement is again very touching but the scherzo is playful and the finale, a rondo, is an excitable and intense ‘allegro agitato’ so that the movements are pleasingly contrasted.
Fesca’s ability to develop his ideas matured further with his longest string quartet, which takes up all of CD 3. It’s in B-flat major and marked as Opus 14. The first movement, at almost thirteen minutes, is also the longest. Sonata form is being exploited in a way a later, romantic composer, would achieve. It also turns out to have the longest finale. One shouldn’t be too surprised at this because as the young composer developed his compositional skills he found himself able to vary his ideas and move even more into what the booklet writer calls ‘far-flung keys’. In truth I feel that the material is not that arresting but its what he does with it that is attractive. But I sometimes found myself wondering, as I listened to this work, if I prefer a composer with something original to say, but who doesn’t always quite know what you do with his/her ideas, or one who has few ideas but really makes them work hard. To emphasise the point even more, the elegant rondo finale is practically monothematic.
CD 4 begins by going back to the Opus 4 quartet in the Beethovian key of C minor and it is a serious minded work, which for me is the pick of the set. The first movement has a rare slow introduction and the Minuetto is more of a scherzo, however the finale lightens the mood and brings the work to a very pleasing and more warm-hearted conclusion. You have certainly, with this work, joined the composer on a forceful emotional journey.
So, if I tell you that the last quartet is the Op 36 in C major (not in C minor as the booklet states) you might very well expect a further advancement, its date being 1825 as opposed to the Opus 4 work published in 1816. But you would be wrong, as Fesca appears to have made something of a ‘volte-face’. The key gives it away perhaps as we are now back in classical Haydnesque territory especially with the first movement and the last, which is an interesting sonata-rondo design. Only the second movement feels slightly different in its lyrical material.
I have only lived with these quartets for a month - the outstanding Amaryllis Quartet must have done so for several months (Volume 1 was recorded by the Diogenes Quartet) and in all truth I am unable or unwilling to detrimentally criticize anything about their interpretations. Indeed it might be that there will never be any alternative versions. All I can say is that everything is clearly recorded, articulated and presented and the booklet notes are some of the most deeply analytical I have ever come across even by CPO’s standards.
For any young quartet group, these works may well be a useful way of including an unfamiliar composer in a concert but not an unfamiliar style. They will, I’m sure, reward performers and as a listener a one-off Fesca quartet would be a gratifying and appealing experience.
Gary Higginson
