Make your own music with your own Free Home Page!Here are our 10 favorite composers of works for two violins, viola and cello:
Oh yes, the Sixteen String Quartets and the Grosse Fuge are always dependable; not a day goes by where we don't spend our evenings with the ferocious Ludwig! From Tampa, Florida, the Dragieva Quartet (Olga Dragieva and Bennett Astrove, violins; Amy Menard, viola; Tom Kersey, cello) play the first movement from the Quartet in F Minor, Op. 95, #11.
This fellow wrote 102 string quartets --- and yet, the vast majority of those works are very rarely programmed in concert! To us, that's a shame --- because anyone capable of writing 102 string quartets automatically deserves our respect and admiration!
Brahms may have composed only three String Quartets, at least two of which he wrote for his good friend Joseph Joachim (and which the Joachim Quartet promptly premiered), but he makes our list because often, when we Longbeards have little else to share with our listeners on a dull summer's evening, we'll turn our entire recital over to Brahms' Three Quartets! (Even quartet ensembles get bored, y'know!) In this performance, cellist Adam Riggs and colleagues play the finale from Brahms' Quartet No. 1. Adam explains that this clip is from his former quartet's last-ever recital.
Nobody else wrote quartets the way Amadeus did --- 23 of them, in fact. And Eine Kleine Nachtmusik has always been at its prettiest when played by a quartet! That, and his equally delicious library of Divertimenti --- what else can we say? Bravissima! Playing the Divertimenti here are the 4 Bowmen of West Hartford, CT's Hartt School of Music (Philip Zakko, age 16, and Andy Sunde, age 14, violins; Andy's 14-year-old brother Ian, viola; and Charlie Wasserman, age 15, cello).
Bartok's Six Quartets are especially challenging to both players and listeners. We Longbeards remember well the Emerson Quartet's marathon recital of the six works. What a journey that experience was! The Fratres Quartet perform the second movement from Bartok' Quartet No. 3.
Gretry's Six Quartets are all in three movements. They're each very short, and quite fun to play. When Gretry wrote in his Autobiography about his prayer to die unless God could make him both an upright man and a good musician, he was, needless to say, very much determined to live up to both wishes any way he could. We, of course, believe he succeeded beyond his wildest expectations.
Dare you count on your fingers the number of times that the Debussy and Ravel Quartets have been recorded together on compact disc? We couldn't, but the Quartet in G Minor, Op. 10 has always wound up on our list of favorites, regardless of all we've tried to accomplish over the years.
Here's something we'd like to see: an entire cable network devoted to Haydn's 83 Quartets --- nothing else, mind you! --- with each and every one of them playing 24 hours a day, 7 days a week! Now, is that a marathon, or what? Anyway, the Mirage Quartet (Jakub Miller and Anileys Bermudez, violins; Luis Diez, viola; Sinan Ercan, cello) performs the Adagio from the "Sunrise" Quartet.
This man wrote fifteen string quartets. The last five of them he wrote when he knew that he was on the verge of death. Only a really daring quartet should play Shostakovich; indeed, we strongly recommend that his Quartet No. 15 be performed only in candlelight, with the four candles to be blown out immediately at the end. Here, the Vita Quartet (Semeon Denisov and Anastasiya Sieonidi, violins; Gulnara Tleugabylova, viola; Peter Karetnikov, cello) performs this violent extract from Shostakovich's Quartet No. 8 in C Minor, Op. 110.
And our Number One favorite composer of works for two violins, viola and cello is.....
Yes, Franz Schubert wrote 15 String Quartets, too. But he tops our list because not only is 'Death and the Maiden' one of our Schubert favorties, not only is his Quartet No. 15 blessed with a rollickingly merry finale ---- Franz has the advantage over his fellow composers thanks largely to his two older brothers and their father, with whom young Franz often played when not composing. What a quartet the four Schuberts made: Ferdie and Iggy, violins; Franz Jr., viola; and Franz Sr., cello! And what a thrill it must have been hearing them jam! Here, a closet fan captures the Miami String Quartet (Ivan Chen and Cathy Robinson, violins; Yu Jin, viola; Keith Robinson, cello) playing the third movement from Death and the Maiden.
And now, here are the 10 quartet works we especially like playing. In fact, these ten pieces have become the most requested works in our repertoire:
We Longbeards have always referred to Mozart's K. 575 as, simply, the Merriest String Quartet Ever Composed! Into that composition, Mozart encapsulated virtually everything having to do with happiness in general and the quartet literature in particular. No other work has the power to so completely tickle our collective fancies!
This, Verdi's only exclusively instrumental work, combines elements of drama, humor, ballet, and frivolity --- all in ONE string quartet! Little wonder we've always enjoyed it over the years!
The most magical Finale: Vivace in the literature belongs to this piece. Though Haydn wrote many Vivace movements during his career, this one was perhaps his most popular. We have long enjoyed playing it, and, by extension, the rest of the quartet as well.
In this quartet, Schubert confronts us with a classic case of the dark side of the planet in all its forms. What amazes most scholars of Schubert's works is the fact that this piece began its life as a simple song (lieder). Still, there's no beating that Presto, and the coda of this quartet also is enjoyable.
Debussy's G Minor, Op. 10 has earned its place among the true romantic works for string quartet; indeed, the Andantino has long had a reputation for bringing tears to the eyes of its listeners. The Tres modere is a bouncy, sizzling reflection of the type of music composers like Debussy were confronted with at the end of the 1890's; we just love it because --- and even we oldtimers must admit this! --- we've always thought it was a neat piece with which we could impress the girls!
Being The Quartet of the Longbeards, we've taken some of our philosophy from Brahms' longtime friendship with Joseph Joachim, whose Quartet premiered at least two of Johannes' three quartets. The C Minor, Op. 51, No. 1, is on our list here because its Romanze is, to us, a reminder of what our philosophy as a quartet stands for.
You could not ask for a more tragically autobiographical work than Smetana's "From My Life." Just when you think that the Vivace will culminate in a triumphant conclusion to the work, suddenly you hear the high note in the first violin --- and then, you experience the composer preparing to undergo the onslaught of his final, horrible madness. At least, we're still tickled by the fact that one of this piece's four movements is designated a la Polka! Here, we hear the Moyzes Quartet (Stanislav Mucha and Fratinsek Torok, violins; Alexander Lakatos, viola, Jan Slavik, cello) performing.
One of the hardest of Beethoven's quartets for us to play, "La Malinconia" (in English, "The Melancholy") reflects the turbulent season of Beethoven's increasing deafness. One can almost hear the powerful lamentations of the Adagio and picture them as if one were bearing witness to Ludwig's inner demons playing war games with him.
This particular quartet certainly lives up to its subtitle: Dvorak, when he wrote it, heard in its four movements the melodies of African-American and other tradtional spiritual, or gospel, rhythms; that these were enough to inspire this piece is a tribute to Dvorak's masterfulness. We think it's the kind of quartet that we can use as something we can play whilst we engage in clever conversation! (As you can imagine, we're not your average traditional string quartet ensemble.) This performance by the Strathcona String Quartet (Jenny Bustin and George Andrix, violins; Moni Matthew, viola; Jospehine van Lier, cello) was shot last February 3rd in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
And our Number One most requested piece in our repertoire is......
Why do we love Borodin? Well, the Notturno is best known to some of you as the popular song "And This is My Beloved" from the Broadway musical (and subsequent MGM feature) 'Kismet' --- which has its key roots in various Borodin melodies! As for the Andante; Vivace, we enjoy playing that part of the piece because it has long been the basis for a game we've never tired of playing: the object here being to determine how long we can sustain the last notes of the coda! At last count, we broke our own record for this attempt by about 35.23 seconds! The lovely ladies performing here are the Annellie Quartet (Gabrielle and Brianna Fischler, violins/violas; Rachel Iba, violin; Jennifer Brent, cello). This clip was shot on New Year's Eve 2006, at the Westport, CT Historical Society, during First Night Westport.
Well, quartet fans, there you have it: The Longbeards' 10 Favorites! We know that some of you might have your own favorite quartet pieces; we are more than happy to invite you to e-mail us with your own favorite works for two violins, viola and cello. Our addresses are: blackbeardian@yahoo.com or electric_pirates@hotmail.com. And even if your choices don't match ours, we hope your listings bring you much pleasure as you enjoy listening to them!
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