Search - Debussy, Ravel, Carmina Quartet :: String Quartets

WOW!

J. Lambie | LA, CA | 11/23/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"It's hard to go wrong buying these pieces which are constantly paired. If you have a favorite quartet, they've probably recorded them. If you like chamber music, you probaly already own decent to excellent versions of these pieces. The music in each is so beautiful it seems almost impossible to do a poor recording of them. There are so many good ones. I own lovely versions by the Tokyo, Emerson, Alban Berg and Lindsay Qts and perfectly good interps by half a dozen others. (I also have the Ravel by the technically incomperable Petersen Qt.) And then there's this one by the Carmina Qt. Who are these people and why are they not better known? I discovered them with their Dvorak Op.96 and 105 recording (which is, as of this writing, still in print and available through Arkiv). Since then, I have had the same experience with their Schubert and Brahms recordings; that experience of being forced to stop and just listen; the feeling that I am hearing these pieces as if for the first time; the feeling of losing my SELF in the music. I cannot recommend this recording too highly."