Customer Reviews

String Quartets, Nos.1 & 3

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The distinctive perspective and insight of Russian musicians furnishes an interesting and valid perception of Western European art-music.

The original string quartet ensemble of the Moskva Conservatory was founded at the end of World War II; this current permutation of the Borodin Quartet has been together since 1974.
This recording was made in Berlin, 1993.

With the String Quartet in c-minor, Op. 51, No. 1, the Borodins take a sensible time scale in the Allegro introduction wherein they accentuate the lyrical while de-emphasizing the dramatic, thusly realizing a very apprehensible presentation.
The Russians achieve an especially ethereal ambience in the rare Romance.
There is a joyous buoyancy with piquant pizzicati in the trio of the Allegretto, and a vivid intensity in the Finale where the lucidity of timing and phrasing aid in aesthetic perception.

In the first movement of Brahms' Bb-major String Quartet, Op. 67, the Borodins achieve the longest timing on record (:11mins), exceeding the Austrian Alban Bergs by a full minute.
They follow up with a rapturously ecstatic reading of the Andante which parallels the visions of the Emersons and the Melos, while actually coming in under the timings of the LaSalles, Amadeus, and ABQ.
The Borodins nicely reveal the glassy am steg timbres (cf. Schönberg's Quartet No. 0) with the guitar-like pizzicati passages in the Allegretto.
At :10mins. the Borodins' realization of the concluding set of Variations is again virtually the longest on record.
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Those hitherto gun-shy of the Brahms String Quartets might consider pairing the most approachable recordings of the Verdi Quartet's Nos. 1 & 2 with this Borodins' issue of Nos. 1 & 3, in order to have the complete set.
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Brahms: String Quartets, Op. 51
Borodin: String Quartet No. 1 in A Major; String Quartet No. 2 in D Major
Tchaikovsky: String Quartets Nos. 1 - 3/Souvenir De Florence
Tchaikovsky: Complete String Quartets
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It has taken me three decades to finally catch on to "classical
music" (I actually disdain these musical labels), and both the music of Brahms and the playing of the Borodin Quartet represent great discoveries for me. Listening to this has left me yearning for more music for strings (I welcome all suggestions). For now I have my ears set on Mendelssohn & Raff: Octets (Chandos - #8790 ).