Formal originality was never one of Niels Gade's strong points, but why he should have chosen to publish his String Quintet No. 1 of 1845 but withhold the delightful String Quartet in F minor of six years later I will never understand. Perhaps he felt the Quartet to be too daring, for the later work is audibly maturer, even innovative at one or two points, whereas the earlier piece stays, for all its romantic excitability, firmly within Mendelssohnian bounds. In itself, the Quintet is none the worse for that; it is a young man's music, engaging if a little brash, but no mean achievement for its then youthful (28-year-old) composer. The Sextet in E flat, though, is an altogether different matter. Composed in 1863 this may be familiar to readers by virtue of its recent advocacy, not least by the Park Lane Sextet who have broadcast it in the UK. It, even more than the early Quartet, evinces a greater confluence of means and ends than does the Quintet and, while it breaks no new ground, must rank as Gade's finest extended chamber work.
The Johannes Ensemble give decent enough performances of both Quintet and Sextet and the recording, made in the Little Easton Church in Essex, is faithful if unexceptional. The writer of the liner-notes is evidently unaware of the two unpublished Gade quartets from 1851 and 1877 which, along with the late D major, Op. 63, have now been recorded by BIS ((CD) CD516, 10/92), so his comments on the chamber music in general have to be treated with a little caution. With a playing time of only 53 minutes it is a great shame that Kontrapunkt chose not to include another chamber work, which would have made the disc rather better value. Still the two recorded here make this a welcome addition to the catalogue and should advance Gade's cause a little further.'