Customer Reviews

Nielsen: String Quartets Vol.2

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According to the cover notes to this recording, Nielsen's string quartets are coming to be regarded as some of the most important chamber music of the late 19th century. Would they'd show up more frequently on string quartet programs--I've never seen them programmed--because they are works well worth knowing. Quartets 1 and 2 have all the restless youthful energy of Nielsen's first two symphonies, along with the typically tender slow movements and, by turns, witty and brooding scherzi that admirers of the symphonies will recognize as Nielsen trademarks.

I slightly prefer the First Quartet, which seems to have an endless stream of good melodies and clever uses for them. I expecially like the fade-away coda of the slow movement, with its sweet harmonics, and although the last movement may outstay its welcome, the last pages ring such interesting changes on the thematic material of the movement that amends are made most generously.

If the string quartet is one of the hardest mediums to write for, it's remarkable how adept this largely self-taught composer was so early in his career at meeting the challenge. These are fully idiomatic quartets that sound as natural to the medium as Mozart's or Mendelssohn's. Now, great music this may not be, but treasurably entertaining music it most definitely is.

As with Naxos' Volume 2, Volume 1 of Nielsen's complete quartets is in the very capable hands of the Oslo Quartet, who obviously take Nielsen as seriously as he needs to be taken. Lovely playing, fine sonics--for Nielsen lovers, this is a must, and for those interested in the fertile byways of late 19th-century chamber music, the disc is highly recommendable as well.

String quartets are like a window to the soul of the composer and Nielsen is wide open in this recording, specially in No. 1 Sensual, but with majestic intentions.

Nielsen has some hints of Schubert, but is very personal.

The performance by the Oslo string quartet is excellent and obviously have a feeling for scandinavian music.

At Naxos prices, a no brainer.

'Tis a pity that these quartets (Volume 1 and 2, Naxos) of Neilsen are not included in the repertoire of the many quartets that frequent the Bay Area. They are certainly romantic and lyrical and complex of interplay and rhythm as the better known romantic composers. Indeed, while I have seen all of Neilsen's symphonies and his violin concerto performed, I, like many other reviewers, had no knowledge of these quartets until Amazon's recommendation algorithm led me to them. Although the earlier quartets lack the great tension or theme that engages us fully, Op. 44 is rich in mood (e.g., the Adagio con sentimento religioso) and symphonic in sweep. It is mature and well-developed, acknowledged by Neilsen himself, and truly delightful. I personally find Neilsen's first quartets a parade of musical statements, each movement interesting but not satisfying in the whole. Op. 13, with its thematic recapitulation, does attempt to string the units together. The Oslo Quartet (and their sound engineers) give us very worthy albums. Budget priced, these recodings should be included in your classical collection, but if you want only one CD, I suggest obtaining Volume 1, with the better Op. 44.

It is something of a surprise that the Nielsen quartets aren't better known. They are, quite simply, fantastic works that would deserve any outing they could get. This release couples the first two published works in the genre, the g minor and f minor ones dating from 1887-88 (revised in 1898) and 1890, respectively (there is an early d minor quartet as well, dating from 1882, but not included in the Oslo Quartet series). The performances are again fresh and bold-faced, colorful and thoroughly sympathetic to the music, without ever reverting to mannerisms and exaggerations - though I could, possibly, imagine more vitality being breathed into both works. Neither of the works contains many traces of the mature Nielsen, but they are still expertly constructed and inventive works in a generally romantic, often Brahmsian (sometimes even Schubertian), style with many imaginative touches and superb melodic ideas, developed with skill and logical clarity. The recording is, again, a little too close for comfort in the louder passages, but usually clear and bright. Again, this is a thoroughly recommendable issue, although I would advise anyone interested to start with the marvelous first volume (the works there are stronger and the performances sound even more committed and spirited).

By historical reasons, the chamber genre experienced at the beginning of the XX Century, a painful aggravation, and among the different expressions, the genre of String Quartets, whose unique heralds were by then Ferrucio Busoni, Max Reger, Arnold Schoenberg, Jean Sibelius and Carl Nielsen. On one hand, the Russian ballets, Mahler's symphonies and the raising Dodecaphonist movement, literally permeated most of musical halls in international stages. The echoes of the musical Impressionism( ravel and Debussy), the appearing of the "Six" (Taileferre, Auric, Honnegger, Milhaud, Satie and Poulenc) and isolated figures of the Neo Romanticism movement (Respighi), were involuntarily factors that somehow eclipsed this appreciated musical expression.

Carl Nielsen gave this genre a vigorous impulse, because understood the enormous importance of its significance. After Beethoven's death, only Schubert, Brahms, Mendelssohn, Schumann and in minor relevance Dvorak, Smetana impressed this genre of refined splendor and creative vigor.

Nevertheless, the deserved reputation of these musical pages, are still far to affiance themselves in the musical taste of the great audiences, although the countless efforts of new chamber ensembles that have proposed themselves to play these works.

Thanks to our technological devices, treasures of such magnitude are available in the market, so this is your opportunity to acquire these priceless compositions that accent still more the prestige and world fame of Carl Nielsen.