Search - Kodaly Quartet :: Schubert: String Quartets (Complete), Vol. 1

Great Performances by Talented Musicians From The Eastern Bl

Octavius | United States | 10/19/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Naxos is probably the best of the smaller labels in classical music. Although Deutsche Grammophon and Phillips are probably the leading contenders along with Sony, they have to pay a high price to make a deal with the likes of Perlman or I Musici di Roma. This among other factors, increases the cost of manufacture and distribution. Naxos is a small independent European label that essentially saw a shrude opening in this market after the Cold War. With the collapse of communism in Russia and Eastern Europe, many state-paid musicians and orchestras found themselves out of work and disbanded. Many of them made deals with Naxos and that is why they are so cheap compared to other labels. The low price has nothing to do with the quality of performance however and that is evident by this performance here.



Schubert was an early Romantic who emulated Beethoven but who was certainly not his imitator. This is perhaps best demonstrated by String Quartet No. 14 which is one of his later works. The piece is named 'Death & The Maiden' because it was based on a German poem of the same title depicting a young but doomed little girl walking innocently along while Death hovers above her. The supporting strings sound more at a scherzo pace instead of the allegro dominating the movement. All of the strings rush in to make their presnce known at once. The suspenseful arangements in which the strings are playing both extended and short frantic notes creates a sense of suspense, that somehting is about to happen. The piece then changes to a more melodic pace but quited short notes behind remind the listener that something is still lurking in the background. This piece is quite advanced for its time and is something more akin to what Schumann or Brahms would compose over 30 years after Schubert's death.



Naxos is usually always a great buy unless you strictly prefer the reputed groups and musicians contracted by the major labels such as Phillips, DG, or Sony. The price is certainly not an indication of performance at all because Eastern Europe and Russia spent a lot of money for musical academies and performances which generated many great musicians. This album is a perfect example."

Schubert's String Quartets

Amy | 08/11/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The last years of Schubert's life were clouded by ill health and the idea of death was a familiar one. His mother, after all, had born fourteen children, of which only five survived, a not uncommon statistical proportion at the time. His String Quartet in D minor was written seven years later, in March, 1824, before a happy summer, to be spent again at Zseliz as tutor to the daughters of Count Johann Karl Esterhazy. This is, nevertheless, a time in Schubert's Life in which illness and thoughts of death were to occupy his mind. The D minor Quartet has death at its heart. The first movement opens with a call to our attention in a strongly marked first subject, to be contrasted with a more yielding lyrical second subject. This is followed by a slow movement that has given the quartet its title. It is in the form of a theme and five variations, the former taken from Schubert's setting of the poem by Matthias Claudius, Der Tod und das Madchen, in which the second section provides apt music and characteristic rhythm for the words of Death himself. The scherzo moves, in its companion trio, into wistful happiness, and leads to a final movement in which some have detected a Dance of Death, its ominous urgency delayed briefly by an emphatic second subject. The four movements, unified in mood and intention, form a work of a very different kind from, for example, the Trout Quintet, in which the world is one of greater peace and serenity. In the D minor Quartet tragedy is near. The Quartettsatz, a single Allegro movement in C minor, was written in December, 1820. Sketches exist for the opening of a second, slow movement, but the existing first movement proves remarkable enough in itself, with its chromatic and agitated first subject and lilting A flat second subject. The work, significant even in its incomplete form, belongs rather to the world of the three last quartets than to the more comfortable domestic setting of the earlier quartets, the last of which had been composed in 1816. It marks, in any case, the beginning of a period in Schubert's life in which his music was becoming known to a wider public. This is another wonderful cd by Naxos at an amazing price with some Schubert's most beautiful music. I highly recommend it."