Emerson String Quartet - Joseph Haydn: The Seven Last Words / Die sieben letzten Worte (2004)
EAC | FLAC | Image (Cue & Log) ~ 260 Mb | Total time: 69:01 | Scans included
Classical | Label: Deutsche Grammophon | # B0002053-02 | Recorded: 2002
EAC | FLAC | Image (Cue & Log) ~ 260 Mb | Total time: 69:01 | Scans included
Classical | Label: Deutsche Grammophon | # B0002053-02 | Recorded: 2002
Not only do these players adopt some very deliberate tempos in movements such as “Sitio”, “Mulier, ecce filius tuus”, and “Consummatum est”, but they also include a quartet transcription of the wind-band introduction to Part 2 of the work’s oratorio version (my other preferred way to enjoy it). Strangely enough, though you might think that the last thing we need is yet another slow movement, it all works surprisingly well. Surely it helps that the group has taken care to compare the quartet arrangement with the orchestral original and to include some of the missing subsidiary musical lines otherwise assigned to the orchestra’s wind section, resulting in a slightly richer texture overall.