It was Milhaud's declared ambition to compose 18 string quartets, one more than Beethoven, an achievement he had already fulfilled by 1950. He was, of course, an enormously prolific composer and his opus list extends to well over 400 entries. He described himself as an essentially Mediterranean composer and there is a life-loving, easy-going quality about his music. Indeed, his best seems to inhabit a world where the sun always shines and where life is gloriously relaxed. Milhaud was a keen chamber-music player in his youth and was, like Hindemith, an accomplished violist. He took part in the first performance of Debussy's Sonata for flute, viola and harp and confessed that when he played through the work to Debussy, who was too ill to attend the actual concert, he was too shy to tell him that he himself was a composer. (Nowadays, he once told me, young students don't betray such reticence and will ring you up just to ask how you spell your name!)
Only a handful of the quartets has reached the catalogue: the Seventh has been recorded twice (on Decca Polydor 78s nd more recently on Supraphon SUAST50583—not submitted for review), the relaxed, rather Debussyan First was available in the early days of LP (Nixa mono QLP4004, 5/53—nla) while the Quartetto Italiano recorded the Twelfth (Columbia mono 33CX1155, 7/54—nla). So the present venture is good news and must be greeted with some enthusiasm: I bought the first of these issues about a year ago on a visit to Paris and welcome its appearance here. In spite of the uneven quality of the music and the limitations of the performances and the recordings, I do not regret having done so. Not that all the music is worth having. The Seventeenth Quartet, Op. 307 (1950), for example, has some strikingly imaginative moments but comes dangerously close to note-spinning, as does the first movement of the Second. Generally speaking, though, the earlier quartets are the freshest and most musically rewarding. The Second, Op. 16 (1915) occupies one side of the single LP (CY653) and is a five-movement work dedicated to Milhaud's friend, the poet Leon Latil, whose death later that year prompted the composition of No. 3, Op. 32. The Second Quartet has good things in it, and in more persuasive hands might make a stronger impression, but no such reservations extend to its successor. Readers who associate Milhaud exclusively with the carefree 1920s will find surprising depth here, particularly in the sombre first movement. This is a moving and often beautiful lament for Latil. The second of the two movements sets one of his poems. Schoenberg had included a soprano in the last movement of his Second Quartet of 1908. Jacques Viret tells us that Milhaud was unacquainted with the Schoenberg piece, though it must be said that the vocal writing is quite angular. I can imagine a more sympathetic advocate than Nicole Oxombre.
The Quartet No. 4, Op. 46 (1918) is quite different, and not dissimilar in style from the more familiar Seventh. It comes from the period when Milhaud served at the French Embassy in Rio de Janeiro as secretary to Paul Claudel. Number 6, Op. 77 was written at Aix-en-Provence in 1922 and dedicated to Poulenc. The three movements are all short and full of those tuneful scraps that periodically seem to collide with each other in a characteristic Milhaudesque fashion. It is a delightful piece and deserves a better performance. The Ninth Quartet, Op. 140 comes from the following decade (1935) and is a beautiful and affecting piece, worth having for the gentle lyricism of its opening movement, though its successor degenerates into note-spinning. The Second World War drove Milhaud to America, where he was a valued member of the faculty at Mills College, California, and to which he returned every other year in the 1950s and 1960s. Here he wrote the Twelfth Quartet, Op. 252, to mark the centenary of Faure's birth, in 1945 and Nos. 14 and 15 three years later. They share the same opus number, 291, and can be performed either separately or together as an Octet for strings. They were recorded in both forms on Supraphon some years ago, but are no longer available. I must say that I find them rather better apart than together, though it must be admitted that they are stronger on ingenuity than inspiration. The Twelfth, however, is a short and gentle piece, well worth a place in the repertoire.
Whatever the merit and interest of the music—and I must declare a strong admiration and affection for Milhaud's music—this set cannot be given an unconditional recommendation. The Arcana Quartet were formed in the early 1970s and come with excellent credentials. But here, I'm afraid, they sound distinctly lack-lustre and suffer from moments of queasy intonation. The recording, too, is not particularly flattering and certainly falls short of distinction. However, if you share my enthusiasm for Milhaud's music, you will want these records all the same.'