5.0 out of 5 stars
Outstanding performances of fascinating music, December 2, 2011
This review is from: Berwald: Quartet / Quintet / Septet (Audio CD)
Since the product details above are so skimpy, I will first clarify that this CD contains recordings by CONSORTIUM CLASSICUM in 1986 of three pieces by Berwald: the QUARTET FOR PIANO, CLARINET, HORN AND BASSOON in E flat (1819); the PIANO QUINTET in C minor (1853); and the SEPTET in B flat (1828). After decades of relative neglect, the recording industry began to do justice to this quirkily individual, jovially inventive composer in the last decade and a half of the 20th century. Berwald's innovations (for example, placing the scherzo in the middle of a slow movement, as a central section) are of a type that results in pieces being succinct and pointed, never long-winded or meandering; and Consortium Classicum are alive to every nuance of the music, delivering committed, full-blooded accounts that rank amongst the finest performances of the Swede's chamber works. I cannot understand why this marvellous record has been allowed to become such a rarity!
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