Franz Schmidt is not generously represented in the current Gramophone Classical Catalogue and is not listed at all in the Compact Disc Guide and Catalogue. The Fourth Symphony from Mehta and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra still survives on Decca (SXL6544, 2/73) and, as it happens, a new recording of the Third Symphony was reviewed on page 43 last month but none of the chamber music is listed now that the G major Piano Quintet has succumbed to deletion (Decca SDD491, 5/76). The Second Symphony is occasionally to be found in specialist lists but, generally speaking, Schmidt's admirers cannot afford to look any gift-horse in the mouth. A recent BBC series, however, gave us a welcome opportunity of assessing his stature.
The Quartet in A major dates from 1925, the year in which he became Director of the Vienna Staatsakademie, though the score was not published until 1962. It thus comes just before the G major Piano Quintet (1926) and the Third Symphony (1928). It is a work of much nobility of feeling and beauty, whose consummate craftsmanship is a joy in itself. When one first hears the opening bars, one's thoughts stray to Reger, Richard Strauss and perhaps Pfitzner, but soon one comes to recognize his dinstinctive voice, and admire the richness and quality of the invention, and mastery of musical design. The sleeve reproduces Schmidt's own programme note on the work, though it does not appear in the now customary French and English translations.
In the absence of any alternative recordings, the collector who wants this quartet has no choice but to invest in this issue. However, I have to say that neither the performance nor the quality of the recorded sound is very distinguished. Tonally it is lacklustre, thanks to the dry acoustic of the small Austrian Radio studio from which it emanates. It does not sound of recent provenance and the sleeve gives no date, but merely notes that the recording derives from the Austrian Radio Archives.'