Elias Quartet - Schumann: Quartets Nos. 2 & 3 (2018) [Official Digital Download 24/96]

The Elias Quartet has already recorded a complete cycle of Beethoven quartets at Wigmore Hall that was extremely well received by the critics. Now Sara Bitlloch, Donald Grant, Martin Saving and Marie Bitlloch present on Alpha an album devoted to Schumann:"We have always had a special affection for Robert Schumann’s Third Quartet. It’s one of the first works we played together. Since then we have often come back to it, as if to a splendid and familiar region that we think we know thoroughly, but which yields up new secrets with each visit. The Second Quartet, on the other hand, was a much later and more complicated discovery for us. The writing is so personal, so unidiomatic for the instruments, so full of nuances, that to begin with we found it hard to come up with a unanimous voice for this work. The enthusiasm of the first movement can easily turn into anxiety if you push it a bit too far. In the slow movement, the texture is sometimes so bare that to convey its tenderness you have to sustain it with great fervour. The capricious Scherzo is bristling with rhythmic pitfalls and requires a diabolical mastery of the instruments, while the Finale is an endless explosion of joy!"

Tracklist:

Robert Schumann (1810 - 1856)

01. String Quartet No. 2 in F Major, Op. 41 No. 2: I. Allegro vivace
02. String Quartet No. 2 in F Major, Op. 41 No. 2: II. Andante quasi variazioni
03. String Quartet No. 2 in F Major, Op. 41 No. 2: III. Scherzo (Presto) – Trio (L'istesso tempo)
04. String Quartet No. 2 in F Major, Op. 41 No. 2: IV. Allegro molto vivace
05. String Quartet No. 3 in A Major, Op. 41 No. 3: I. Andante espressivo – Allegro molto moderato
06. String Quartet No. 3 in A Major, Op. 41 No. 3: II. Assai agitato
07. String Quartet No. 3 in A Major, Op. 41 No. 3: III. Adagio molto
08. String Quartet No. 3 in A Major, Op. 41 No. 3: IV. Finale (Allegro molto vivace)