Emanuel Ax, Jaime Laredo, Isaac Stern, Yo-Yo Ma - Brahms: The Piano Quartets, Opp. 25, 26 & 60 (1990)
BAND/ARTIST: Emanuel Ax, Jaime Laredo, Isaac Stern, Yo-Yo Ma
- Title: Brahms: The Piano Quartets, Opp. 25, 26 & 60
- Year Of Release: 1990
- Label: Sony Classical
- Genre: Classical
- Quality: flac lossless (tracks)
- Total Time: 02:07:26
- Total Size: 522 mb
- WebSite: Album Preview
Tracklist
CD1
01. Piano Quartet No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 25: I. Allegro
02. Piano Quartet No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 25: II. Intermezzo. Allegro ma non troppo - Trio. Animato
03. Piano Quartet No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 25: III. Andante con moto - Animato
04. Piano Quartet No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 25: IV. Rondo alla zingarese. Presto - Meno presto - Molto presto
05. Piano Quartet No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 60: I. Allegro ma non troppo
06. Piano Quartet No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 60: II. Scherzo. Allegro
07. Piano Quartet No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 60: III. Andante
08. Piano Quartet No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 60: IV. Allegro comodo
CD2
01. Piano Quartet No. 2 in A Major, Op. 26: I. Allegro non troppo
02. Piano Quartet No. 2 in A Major, Op. 26: II. Poco adagio
03. Piano Quartet No. 2 in A Major, Op. 26: III. Scherzo. Poco allegro - Trio
04. Piano Quartet No. 2 in A Major, Op. 26: IV. Finale. Allegro
The piano quartet--one of music's many curious misnomers--relies on a particularly subtle interplay between its contrasting textures of strings and keyboard. The synergy of the four musicians on this CD (each a star on his respective instrument), as in their account of the Mozart piano quartets, creates a shared dynamic that brings the expressive depths that Brahms positively poured into this idiom. They've managed to develop a style of breathing together with a kind of lucidly organic inevitability.
The first quartet (in G minor) exhales Brahms's empathetic engagement with the chamber music of Schubert (the piece marked his Viennese debut) but would have a profound impact on Arnold Schoenberg, who wrote a notable essay on it extolling "Brahms the progressive" and later scored it for full orchestra. There's a similarly Schubertian leisureliness to the Quartet in A, but in these musicians' hands, its length unfolds as a horn of plenty, fertile in its musical invention, with an especially magical lushness in the romantic "Nachtstuck" slow movement. But the real emotional centerpiece here is the C Minor Quartet (also known as the Werther Quartet from its purported inspiration in Goethe's novel). Ax, Stern, Laredo, and Ma bring a concentrated power and broiling originality to their account, instilling its moments of anguish and harmonic dislocation with searingly tragic energy. The Andante in particular emerges as a sustained rhapsody as the musicians play off each other's phrasing to build a statement of majestic eloquence.
Emanuel Ax - Piano
Jaime Laredo - Viola
Isaac Stern - Violin
Yo-Yo Ma - Cello
Johannes Brahms - Composer
CD1
01. Piano Quartet No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 25: I. Allegro
02. Piano Quartet No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 25: II. Intermezzo. Allegro ma non troppo - Trio. Animato
03. Piano Quartet No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 25: III. Andante con moto - Animato
04. Piano Quartet No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 25: IV. Rondo alla zingarese. Presto - Meno presto - Molto presto
05. Piano Quartet No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 60: I. Allegro ma non troppo
06. Piano Quartet No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 60: II. Scherzo. Allegro
07. Piano Quartet No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 60: III. Andante
08. Piano Quartet No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 60: IV. Allegro comodo
CD2
01. Piano Quartet No. 2 in A Major, Op. 26: I. Allegro non troppo
02. Piano Quartet No. 2 in A Major, Op. 26: II. Poco adagio
03. Piano Quartet No. 2 in A Major, Op. 26: III. Scherzo. Poco allegro - Trio
04. Piano Quartet No. 2 in A Major, Op. 26: IV. Finale. Allegro
The piano quartet--one of music's many curious misnomers--relies on a particularly subtle interplay between its contrasting textures of strings and keyboard. The synergy of the four musicians on this CD (each a star on his respective instrument), as in their account of the Mozart piano quartets, creates a shared dynamic that brings the expressive depths that Brahms positively poured into this idiom. They've managed to develop a style of breathing together with a kind of lucidly organic inevitability.
The first quartet (in G minor) exhales Brahms's empathetic engagement with the chamber music of Schubert (the piece marked his Viennese debut) but would have a profound impact on Arnold Schoenberg, who wrote a notable essay on it extolling "Brahms the progressive" and later scored it for full orchestra. There's a similarly Schubertian leisureliness to the Quartet in A, but in these musicians' hands, its length unfolds as a horn of plenty, fertile in its musical invention, with an especially magical lushness in the romantic "Nachtstuck" slow movement. But the real emotional centerpiece here is the C Minor Quartet (also known as the Werther Quartet from its purported inspiration in Goethe's novel). Ax, Stern, Laredo, and Ma bring a concentrated power and broiling originality to their account, instilling its moments of anguish and harmonic dislocation with searingly tragic energy. The Andante in particular emerges as a sustained rhapsody as the musicians play off each other's phrasing to build a statement of majestic eloquence.
Emanuel Ax - Piano
Jaime Laredo - Viola
Isaac Stern - Violin
Yo-Yo Ma - Cello
Johannes Brahms - Composer
As a ISRA.CLOUD's PREMIUM member you will have the following benefits:
- Unlimited high speed downloads
- Download directly without waiting time
- Unlimited parallel downloads
- Support for download accelerators
- No advertising
- Resume broken downloads