Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor Rob Barnett Editor in Chief
John Quinn Contributing Editor Ralph Moore Webmaster
David Barker Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf MusicWeb Founder Len Mullenger
Wolfgang Amadeus
MOZART (1756-1791)
String Quartet No.18 in A major K464 (1785) [32:38] Ludwig van BEETHOVEN (1770-1827)
String Quartet No.12 in E flat major Op.127 (1825) [35:37]
Amadeus
Quartet
rec. Funkhaus. Saal 2, WDR Cologne, February 1956 MEDICI
ARTS MM007-2 [68:26]
The
Amadeus recorded both quartets twice in their commercial
discography; K464 in 1951 and 1964 and Op.127 in 1963 and
again in 1978. There must be a number of other broadcasts
slumbering in radio and other archives. Their performances
in concert were almost invariably more communicative and
that much more forceful and both these 1956 examples demonstrate
the fact if not graphically then subtly.
One
would hardly expect graphic differences in any case. A cursory
check of tempo correlations shows how stable the Amadeus’s
conceptions remained, how little subject to vagary or caprice. What
is true is that there’s more of a sense of occasion in the
Cologne broadcast than in the two studio recordings of K464,
especially in the outer movements. The 1964 recording was
rather studio recessed but it’s not this alone that accounts
for the greater sense of immediacy and tactile interchange,
which the quartet brought to bear in Cologne. The timings
remained almost identical in the last three movements. The
scherzo is fine, with a particularly good trio and plenty
of shifting colour patterns. In the finale we have the advantage
of hearing Schidlof really playing out in a way that studio
conditions seemingly didn’t encourage or balance engineers
suppressed or Schidlof himself didn’t feel acceptable in
terms of balance. Here it sounds fine – assertive without
being aggressive.
The
Beethoven Op.127 receives a powerful and involving performance.
Tully Potter is right to characterise it as intense. Superficially
it too differs little in correlative or comparative terms
from the commercial readings but it differs in intensities
of attack and in a sense of greater weight. Such things can
lead to brief moments of executant frailty and one such occurs
in the slow movement when Brainin’s intonation wanders off
course. But that is a small price to pay for the level of
corporate sonority, for the consistently high level of expressive
control and the acute sense of pacing and architectural control
wielded in each movement.
So
even if you have one, or other, or both of the studio recordings
made over the years by the Amadeus you may still wish to
hear them in the studio, in excellent sound, on tour, when
the temperature was slightly higher and the results even
more consistently involving.
Reviews
from previous months Join the mailing list and receive a hyperlinked weekly update on the
discs reviewed. details We welcome feedback on our reviews. Please use the Bulletin
Board
Please paste in the first line of your comments the URL of the review to
which you refer.