Mstation Classical Reviews

Age of the Diva Albinoni Almost Christmas Arias, Hampson, Harnoncourt Bach Keyboard Concertos Bach Viola Bach, Barenboim Bach, Cantatas Bach, Concertos Bach, JS, Keyboard Works Bach, Mass in B Minor Bach, Mutter Bach, trio-sonatas Baroque Christmas Album Baroque Trumpet Bartok, Concertos Bartoli Bartoli, Opera Proibita Bax, Baroque Beethoven Piano Beethoven String Quartets Beethoven and Brahms Beethoven, piano Bella Donna: Courtly Love Belle Epoque Melodies Berlioz, Les Troyens Binchois, Dufay Boccherini, Cello Concertos Boxed Baroque Boyce, Eight Symphonies British Light Classics British Piano Concertos Brubeck, The Gates of Justice Bruch, Violin Concerto Callas Canteloube, Chants d'Auvergne Carols Chanticleer, Sound in Spirit Charpentier Charpentier, Lebegue Christmas 04 Christmas Vespers Contemporary and Medieval Copland Delius Der Rosenkavalier Dukachev - Beethoven, Prokofiev, Rachminov Elgar Elgar, Marches Elgar, The Enigma Variations Faure songs French Medieval Songs Fux Gounod, Faust Graham: Causon, Ravel, Debussy Great Ballets Grieg, Franck Handel Arias Handel, Deborah Handel, Messiah Handel, The Triumph ... Handel, Water Music DVD Hapsburg Music Haydn Haydn, Handel DVD's Herz Piano Jane Austen's Songbook Josefowicz Recital King's Singers La Fille Mal Gardee Lang Lang and Yo Yo Ma: Farewell Isabella and Chinese things Lauridsen Llibre Vermell Luci, Bartoli, and a dead diva Lully, Comedies-ballets, Phaeton Maerzmusik sampler Mahler Symphony No 7 Mahler, Berg Mantovani Matsudaira Medieval French Songs Mendelssohn Sacred Mendelssohn, Dvorak Messa di Gloria Michael Haydn Miles Davis ... sorta Monterverdi, Orfeo Monteverdi Vespers Monteverdi, Poppea Monteverdi, The Sacred Music 3 Monteverdi, Vivaldi, Handel Montiverdi Vespers Morricone Mozart Symphonies Mozart, Cosi fan tutte Mozart, Exsultate Jubilate Mozart, Mass in C Minor Mozart, symphonies 40, 41 Mozart: Die Zauberflote Mozart: the string quartets Mozrt Requiem Mutter Mozart New English Hymnal New RSS system and Feeds Nikolay Roslavets Peerson, Latin Motets Penguins March Pergolesi, La Serva Padrona Philip Glass, Symphonies 2 and 3 Poulenc concerto Proms Purcell - Dido and Aeneas Purcell Sonatas Purcell: Dido and Aeneas Rachmaninov, Piano Ramallah - Beethoven No. 5 Rameau, Les Paladins Reger, Bach and Telemann Variations Renaissance Organ Music Romantic Cello Concertos Romantic Violin Russian Album -Anna Netrebko Rutter Mass Sanctuary, the heart has its reasons Scarlatti, The complete Keyboard Sonatas Schubert and Mozart piano Schubert Đ Death and the Maiden Shostakovich Shostakovich and Schnittke, Cello Shostakovich/Josefowicz Sibelius String Quartets Sixteen: Ikon South American Baroque Stainer, The Crucifiction Sting does Dowland Strauss tone poem Takemitsu Tallis Tchaikovsky, Symphony No 5, Verdi, Sibelius The Kirov celebrates Nijinsky Toshiro Mayazumi Vaughan Williams Verdi View from a dark tunnel Virginal -Susann van Soldt Vivaldi Cello Vivaldi, Motezuma Vivaldi, Sacred Music Vivaldi: Dixit Dominus Von Otter Wagner, Das Rheingold Wagner, Gotterdammerung DVD Water Music, Music for the Royal Fireworks Weir, Gillian Weiss / Lindberg Lute Whitacre, Cloudburst Williams, Bingham: Mass von Weber, Chamber Music

Sat, 02 Sep 2006 Beethoven String Quartets Ludwig van BEETHOVEN (1770-1827) String Quartet in E flat Op 126 [33.43] String Quartet in a minor Op 132 [41.16] The Hagen Quartet rec Nov 2003 [Op 132] and Mar 2004 [Op 127], Schloss Mondsee and Minnesangersaal, Wiesloch, Germany DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON 00289 477 5705 [75.07] A well-filled late Beethoven disc here. This is the sort of modern performance that will easily find a place on the collector’s shelves. The Hagen quartet (Lukas, Veronika and Clemens Hagen and Rainer Schmidt) have established such a reputation for seriousness that this music is eminently suitable for them. The recording quality is classic Deutsche Grammophon stuff, warm and spacious with each of the instrumental lines clearly defined within a whole of great sonic flavour. The opening of the finale of the Op 132 quartet creeps up on the listener, without giving a hint of the turbulence that will be very shortly unleashed. In both works the slow movements are far-and-away the most substantial and the Hagens play these with appropriate gravitas and substance, but without loosing sight of the melodic aspects also. This whole nature of late Beethovenian thinking has been examined in endless detail elsewhere, and the works become no less surprising on repeated listenings. However, there is an aspect with which this writer would take issue in the conventional approach to this music. The word that is almost invariably used to describe the late quartets is “difficult”. These are supposedly “difficult” music to understand. Personally one thinks this un-helpful to anybody who is not familiar with this music. It is no more “difficult”, in terms of the enjoyment to be gained from the listening experience, than any of Mozart’s chamber works, than Poulenc’s or Messiaen’s song, indeed, than Handel’s Italian operas. The listener who may be unfamiliar with late Beethoven, indeed who may be unfamiliar with the whole string quartet of even the whole chamber music genre should not shy away from a recording like this because of preconceived notions of incomprehensibility. This music just requires the listener to pay attention and to let Beethoven do the talking. It is beautiful stuff – far more enjoyable that much other Beethoven; one thinks of the over-vaunted and bombastic 9th symphony of the same period – and these performances are easily comparable to the great interpretations of the past. © Peter Wells 2006 [] permanent link