CATALAN STRING QUARTETS
Josep SOLER String Quartet No 1
(1974)
Miquel ROGER String Quartet No 2
(1994)
Albert SARDA String Quartet
(1978)
Josep SOLER String Quartet No 5 (1994)
Kreutzer Quartet
rec 26-28 Aug 1998, St John's, Loughton
METIER MSV CD 92026
[79.15]
Crotchet
Metier
This tightly packed Metier issue digs deep into a little known and unfashionable
corner of the string quartet repertoire. The quartet is a far from populist
medium (pace Elvis Costello and the Kronos) and when you combine this
with the 1970s hurly-burly language of a Catalan Schnittke one is reaching
deep. The music never stays still long enough to boring. Its relentless
invention, pizzicato sprints, shrieks and howls are not unmusical but a return
trip though undoubtedly rewarding may not be encouraged. This contrasts with
the still forbidding but more approachable Roger work which in its slides
and melodic fragments takes us into the late Beethoven quartets with a lyric
spin familiar from Benjamin Frankel's quartets (recorded admirably and complete
on CPO). The Sarda's Schoenbergian quartet presents an unyielding face to
the listener. It is a dense and obdurate piece - tough and passionate. It
slips and slides into quarter notes rather like the John Foulds Cello Sonata
(a work of a more welcomingly lyric expressivity). The 1995 Soler work shrugs
off the dodecaphonics of years gone by. The contrast is stunning. Think of
the subtle regretful melodics of the central movement of the Tippett Triple
Concerto and mix that with the quiet but confident explorations of the late
quartets of Beethoven. The tonality drifts mistily but there is no harshness;
no violent assaults. At the same time the music is not anodyne. At times
it communicates as an epic passacaglia - confident and fluent.
We would have benefited from some more biographical information about the
three composers.
Otherwise this is a very fine disc for a discerning audience. The music would
make apt late night listening.
Rob Barnett
Three 12 tone string quartets and one tonal quartet. Music both tough and
subtle. Only the Sarda strikes me as weak. First class upfront recording.
