Chiaroscuro Quartet

Chiaroscuro Quartet – Beethoven: String Quartets Op. 74 & Op. 130 (2023) [Official Digital Download 24bit/192kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · November 21, 2023 · Comments off

After the six Op. 18 quartets, the much-acclaimed Chiaroscuro Quartet now turns to two masterpieces from Beethoven’s middle and late periods. String Quartet No. 10 in E flat major, Op. 74, nicknamed ‘Harp’ because of the abundant pizzicati in its first movement, comes across as a genial and unproblematic work that was very well received immediately upon publication and has remained one of the composer’s best-loved quartets. String Quartet No. 13 in B flat major, Op. 130, is in a very different vein. Belonging to the series of so-called ‘late’ quartets composed between 1824 and 1826, it is a six-movement structure modelled on an eighteenth-century divertimento, adding two movements to the traditional four-movement scheme: an Alla danza tedesca and a Cavatina. Despite its evocation of an archaic dance, the Alla danza tedesca is typically Beethovenian, with its original treatment of dynamics. The Cavatina, which moved the composer to tears during its composition, is a lyrical and moving piece. Beethoven had intended to conclude this imposing work with a large-scale fugue, but its boldness baffled his first listeners and, at the request of his publisher, he resorted instead to a more approachable movement presenting a mixture of laconic dryness and, in places, tender lyricism.

(more…)

Chiaroscuro Quartet – Haydn: String Quartets Op. 33 Nos 1-3 (2023) [Official Digital Download 24bit/192kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · June 13, 2023 · Comments off

“Gut strings and classical bows are also the tools of a captivating quest for sonority”, French magazine Diapason recently wrote to describe the Chiaroscuro Quartet. After Op. 20, Joseph Haydn’s first major string quartet cycle, and Op. 76, his last, the internationally renowned ensemble is now embarking on the Quartets Op. 33, dubbed the “Russian Quartets” and dedicated to the Russian Grand Duke Paul, the future Tsar Paul I.

(more…)

Chiaroscuro Quartet – Haydn: ‘Sun’ Quartets Op.20, Nos. 4-6 (Vol. 2) (2017) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · March 5, 2023 · Comments off

The so-called ‘Sun’ quartets of Joseph Haydn’s Op. 20 are often said to represent an unprecedented flowering of his string quartet writing, establishing a high watermark to which every other subsequent composer of quartets has paid homage. The six quartets are not a monument of compositional rectitude or propriety, however – it is rather their flexibility, variety and unpredictability that make them so compelling. Every bar is full of a sense of musical adventure, a palpable feeling that Haydn is creating bridges between styles and ideas and forging a composite vision of four-part string writing that draws on every historical source that he knew as well as the furthest reaches of his musical imagination.

On this second instalment, the last three quartets of the set are performed by the Chiaroscuro Quartet, a highly international ensemble formed in 2005 by the violinists Alina Ibragimova (Russia) and Pablo Hernán Benedí (Spain), the Swedish violist Emilie Hörnlund and cellist Claire Thirion from France. Dubbed ‘a trailblazer for the authentic performance of High Classical chamber music’ in Gramophone, the quartet plays on gut strings, and the previous instalment was singled out as a recommended disc by The Strad, whose reviewer described its contents as ‘period-instrument performances of the utmost subtlety and refinement.

(more…)

Chiaroscuro Quartet – Haydn: ‘Sun’ Quartets Op.20, Nos. 1-3 (Vol. 1) (2016) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · March 5, 2023 · Comments off

The six so-called ‘Sun’ quartets of Joseph Haydn’s Op. 20 are often said to represent an unprecedented flowering of his string quartet writing, establishing a high watermark to which every other subsequent composer of quartets has paid homage. For all their iconic status the Op. 20 quartets are not a monument of compositional rectitude or propriety, however – it is rather their flexibility, variety and unpredictability that make them so compelling. Every bar is full of a sense of musical adventure, a palpable feeling that Haydn is creating bridges between styles and ideas and forging a composite vision of four-part string writing that draws on every historical source that he knew as well as the furthest reaches of his musical imagination.

On this first volume, the first three quartets of the set are performed by the Chiaroscuro Quartet, a highly international ensemble formed in 2005 by the violinists Alina Ibragimova (Russia) and Pablo Hernán Benedí (Spain), the Swedish violist Emilie Hörnlund and cellist Claire Thirion from France. Dubbed ‘a trailblazer for the authentic performance of High Classical chamber music’ in Gramophone, the quartet plays on gut strings and its unique sound – described in The Observer as ‘a shock to the ears of the best kind’ – is admired by audiences and critics all over Europe. Appearing for the first time on BIS, the Chiaroscuro Quartet has a growing and acclaimed discography and in 2015 received Germany’s most prestigious CD award, the Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik.

(more…)

Chiaroscuro Quartet – Mozart: The Prussian Quartets (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · January 7, 2023 · Comments off

After their exciting interpretations of Haydn, Beethoven and Schubert, the Chiaroscuro Quartet now turns to Mozart’s Prussian Quartets, his last compositions for this formation. These quartets were written for Friedrich Wilhelm II, King of Prussia and amateur cellist, and offer that instrument an unusually prominent role. The first of the three was composed fairly quickly, in June 1789, but the next two were not completed until the following year, and in the end Mozart’s plan for a set of six came to nothing.

(more…)

Chiaroscuro Quartet – Haydn: String Quartets, Op.76 (2020) MCH SACD ISO + Hi-Res FLAC

SACD / DSD By admin · November 29, 2022 · Comments off

The Chiaroscuro Quartet was formed in 2005 by the violinists Alina Ibragimova (Russia) and Pablo Hernán Benedí (Spain), the Swedish violist Emilie Hörnlund and cellist Claire Thirion from France. The Chiaroscuro Quartet made their first appearance on BIS with acclaimed recordings of Joseph Haydn’s Sun Quartets, Op. 20, described in The Strad as ‘period-instrument performances of the utmost subtlety and refinement’. The Op. 20 quartets are widely regarded as a mile-stone in the history of the genre. When Chiaroscuros now return to Haydn, it is with his last complete set of quartets, begun in 1796 when he was 64 years old.

The Six String Quartets, Op. 76, form one of the most renowned of Haydn’s sets of quartets, and carry the stamp of their maker: No other set of eighteenth-century string quartets is so diverse, or so unconcerned with the norms of the time. In the words of Haydn’s friend and contemporary Charles Burney ‘they are full of invention, fire, good taste and new effects’. On the present disc, the first of two, we hear the first three quartets, including the ‘Fifths’ quartet (No. 2) so named after the falling perfect fifths with which it begins. The most famous of the set – and possibly of all Haydn quartets – is No. 3, however: the ‘Emperor’ quartet with its second movement: a set of variations on the ‘Kaiserlied’ which Haydn had recently composed to the greater glory of the Austrian Emperor Franz II.

(more…)

Chiaroscuro Quartet – Schubert: String Quartets Nos. 14 & 9 (2018) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · November 17, 2022 · Comments off

Founded in 2005, the Chiaroscuro Quartet brings together musicians from all the corners of Europe: the Russian Alina Ibragimova and the Spaniard Pablo Hernán Benedi on violins, the Swede Emilie Hörlund on the viola and France’s Claire Thirion on the cello. From their very first performances Chiaroscuro have been hailed as “a trailblazer for the authentic performance of High Classical chamber music” by the very highbrow UK music magazine Gramophone, and “a shock to the ears of the best kind” byThe Observer. Indeed, their performance of Schubert is compelling in its rhythmic freedom and its limitless palette of contrasts. It goes from the gentlest pianissimo to the most resounding full-bowed fortissimos by way of a thousand and one shades which are hardly ever heard in the performances of “classical” quartets. In their hands, the discourse of Death and the Maiden takes on a bitterness, a pure romanticism and even a level of modernity as they strip out the rather sepia-Vienna aspect which some traditional interpretations feature. As for the Ninth Quartet in G minor, it’s one of the those Schubertian miracles written in his adolescence: coming to light in 1815 its discourse is indeed tragic, but lacking in the inconsolable depth of Death and the Maiden. However, this doesn’t make it any less of a masterpiece.

(more…)

Chiaroscuro Quartet – Haydn: String Quartets Op. 76 Nos. 1-3 (2020) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · November 17, 2022 · Comments off

The Chiaroscuro Quartet made their first appearance on BIS Records with acclaimed recordings of Joseph Haydn’s “Sun” Quartets, Op. 20, described in “The Strad” as ‘period-instrument performances of the utmost subtlety and refinement’. The Op. 20 Quartets are widely regarded as a mile-stone in the history of the genre. When Chiaroscuros now return to Haydn, it is with his last complete set of quartets, begun in 1796 when he was 64 years old.

(more…)

Chiaroscuro Quartet – Haydn: String Quartets, Op. 76 Nos. 4-6 (2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · November 17, 2022 · Comments off

The Chiaroscuro Quartet made their first appearance on BIS with acclaimed recordings of Joseph Haydn’s Sun Quartets, Op. 20, described in The Strad as ‘period-instrument performances of the utmost subtlety and refinement’. The Op. 20 quartets are widely regarded as a mile-stone in the history of the genre. When Chiaroscuros now return to Haydn, it is with his last complete set of quartets, begun in 1796 when he was 64 years old.

(more…)

Chiaroscuro Quartet – Beethoven: String Quartets, Op. 18 Nos. 1-3 (2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · November 17, 2022 · Comments off

For a string player, Beethoven’s 16 quartets are of an importance similar to that of his sonatas to a pianist, or his symphonies to a conductor. As a body they form the culmination of all the chamber music composed before them, and to this day they remain a benchmark for every composer of string quartets. The Chiaroscuro Quartet begin their cycle of these works at the same place as Beethoven did, with the Op. 18 set which occupied him intensively for the best part of two years (1798 – 1800). The effort he put into these quartets was surely due to the fact that he had much to live up to – they would be measured against those of Haydn and Mozart, who had raised the genre to a supreme vehicle for ‘learned’ taste and subtle, civilized musical discourse.

(more…)

Chiaroscuro Quartet – Beethoven: String Quartets, Op. 18 Nos. 4-6 (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 27, 2022 · Comments off

Chiaroscuro Quartet - Beethoven: String Quartets, Op. 18 Nos. 4-6 (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download

For a string player, Beethoven’s 16 quartets are of an importance similar to that of his sonatas to a pianist and for every composer of string quartets they remain a benchmark. The Chiaroscuro Quartet have begun their cycle of these works at the same place as Beethoven did, with the Op. 18 set which occupied him intensively for the best part of two years (1798 – 1800). The effort he put into these quartets was surely due to the fact that he had much to live up to – they would after all be measured against those of Haydn and Mozart.
(more…)