As anyone who has heard them in the flesh will testify, the Borodin Quartet produces a particularly sumptuous sonority, refined in blend and beautifully balanced, and their ensemble and intonation are impeccable. They are an aristocrat among quartets and having heard them in the same acoustic (London's St John's, Smith Square) as the Alban Berg, the Melos and the Tokyo Quartets within a relatively short period of time, I have to say that I thought them unsurpassed in terms of homogeneity and beauty of tone. Coming to this new set immediately after the Orford Quartet's Beethoven recordings reviewed above, I was relieved that extremes of dynamic and colour are not highlighted as they are by the Canadian ensemble, and that the music is permitted to unfold without recourse, as it were, to interpretative sub-titles.
So far there have been two issues in the Borodin/Virgin Classics cycle—Opp. 59 No. 3 and 95 ((CD) VC7 90713-2, 8/88), and Opp. 18 No. 4 and 132 ((CD) VC7 90746-2, 6/89) neither of which were as well received as I would have expected. Writing in these columns DJF found ''an absence of the searching quality and intimacy which distinguish both the Talich and the Vegh recordings''. But, then, of course, the fact remains that very few of the ensembles now before the public are as penetrating as these two ensembles, though as far as Op. 59 No. 1 is concerned, the Lindsay must be added to their number.
Beauty and truth do not always go hand in hand and the search for the former can so often obscure the latter. I must say that it is difficult to resist the sheer beauty of the Borodin's playing in the opening of the A major Quartet, and the sweetness and elegance of Mikhail Kopelman's phrasing. Kopelman's sound at the opening of the Minuet is glorious, though I could have wished that the Borodin's tone had darkened more at bar 40 (track 2, 0'48'') and that the second half of the Minuet repeat had been observed. They could perhaps have differentiated in character between the Minuet and the theme and variations. Here I was put in mind of Robert Simpson's remark about the Alban Berg Quartet in the late 1970s, that ''they were in danger of becoming mere beautifiers of the classics''. At times one feels the Borodin's playing is perhaps just too mellifluous and too gracious.
Their interpretation of the first Rasumovsky certainly stresses beauty rather than truth, though it would be quite wrong to call it a superficial reading. Everything is beautifully ordered and well held together, and the sheer quality of the sound they produce is glorious. On the whole tempos are well chosen throughout and they eschew idiosyncracy. So mellifluous is the tone they produce that in the second movement they underline a link to Schubert (bar 171, track 6, 3'05'') until one hears unmistakable pre-echoes of the C major Quintet (bar 192, 3'32''). Nor can one complain that their slow movement is wanting in eloquence: this is songful and lyrical playing. However, while they command Schubertian sweetness of tone, there is little sense of pain.
The Virgin recording made in St Martin's Church, East Woodhay, is well balanced and bright without in any way suffering from glare. I would want to have this record, even if it does not say everything that has to be said about Beethoven: to come closer to him you must turn to quartets like the Vegh (Auvidis Valois/Pinnacle) Quartetto Italiano (Philips), Lindsay (ASV) and Talich (Calliope/Harmonia Mundi).'