HAYDN; MOZART; SCHUBERT Quartets (Quatour Akilone)
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Joseph Haydn, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Franz Schubert
Genre:
Chamber
Label: Mirare
Magazine Review Date: 04/2019
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 68
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: MIR388
![MIR388. HAYDN; MOZART; SCHUBERT Quartets (Quatour Akilone)](https://reviews.azureedge.net/gramophone/media-thumbnails/akilone_quartet.jpg)
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
(6) String Quartets (Divertimentos), 'Sun', Movement: C |
Joseph Haydn, Composer
Joseph Haydn, Composer Quatour Akilone |
String Quartet No. 14 |
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Composer
Quatour Akilone Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Composer |
String Quartet No. 12, 'Quartettsatz' |
Franz Schubert, Composer
Franz Schubert, Composer Quatour Akilone |
Author: Charlotte Gardner
I’m taking the trouble to relay the quartet’s written thoughts because I’ve been so struck by how very audible this gradual transformation is across their three interpretations, to the extent that, having already listened extensively before reading the booklet, I didn’t need to be told that this was a rhetorical journey in time. Likewise the idea of polarity that they’ve adopted following discussions with their mentor, Alban Berg Quartet founder Hatto Beyerle; listen in the Schubert to the dynamic extremes happening on the flip of a coin, or the juxtaposition of music and silence in the Haydn second movement.
In fact, particularly with the Haydn, some readers who prefer a little bloom may find their playing a touch dry. However, it is immensely classy: elegant, precise and dainty, sounding very much like a lively and intelligent conversation. I’ve also been enjoying the sharp, slightly unblended edge to all this precision in some of the punchier moments of octave homophony; and note that this impression of different personalities coming together is very deliberate, as is clear when you compare it to the blending of, say, the two violins moving together alone in sixths in bar 19 of the slow movement, or their poetic duetting in the later cantabile section, where Elise De Bendelac’s second violin sensitively holds back from Emeline Concé’s first. (An interesting comparative reference point, if you are trying to work out what you think of all the above, is the Chiaroscuro Quartet’s reading – BIS, A/16).
There is a very slight filling-out of the textures for the Mozart, and again for the Schubert; the latter is an interpretation that keeps fragility and vulnerability to the fore, even where the tension might perhaps be allowed to slacken a bit.
A superbly played, intelligent and thought-provoking debut. Félicitations á tous.
Explore the world’s largest classical music catalogue on Apple Music Classical.
Included with an Apple Music subscription. Download now.
![](/media/251890/gramophone_-08_24-_magsubscriptions-images_600x600px2.png?anchor=center&mode=crop&width=370&height=500&rnd=133676644160000000?quality=60)
Gramophone Digital Club
- Digital Edition
- Digital Archive
- Reviews Database
- Full website access
From £8.75 / month
Subscribe![](/media/251891/gramophone_-08_24-_magsubscriptions-images_600x600px3-1.png?anchor=center&mode=crop&width=370&height=500&rnd=133676644280000000?quality=60)
Gramophone Full Club
- Print Edition
- Digital Edition
- Digital Archive
- Reviews Database
- Full website access
From £11.00 / month
Subscribe
If you are a library, university or other organisation that would be interested in an institutional subscription to Gramophone please click here for further information.