Ehnes Quartet

Ehnes Quartet – Schubert: String Quartet No. 14 ‘Death and the Maiden’; Sibelius: String Quartet ‘Intimate Voices’ (2016)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:14:01 minutes | 1,33 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Onyx Classics

Death preyed heavily on the minds of both Schubert and Sibelius when they were composing the two string quartets on this new recording from the Ehnes Quartet. Sibelius had undergone several operations to remove a tumour in his throat. The bleak and highly personal 4th Symphony is the masterwork from this period, but the string quartet ‘Intimate Voices’ of 1908 should not be underestimated. Taut and highly concentrated, it has an almost Haydnesque construction, and the quartet’s first movement’s sheer perfection of form approaches that of the 3rd Symphony’s opening movement.

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Ehnes Quartet – Beethoven: String Quartets Nos. 12 & 14 (2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:13:59 minutes | 1,33 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © PM Classics Ltd.

The second instalment in the Ehnes Quartet’s survey of the late Beethoven Quartets recorded in the US with their producer overseeing the sessions from London as the pandemic saw the UK travel plans and sessions cancelled. They bring to these masterworks many years of experience: ‘the four CDs we recorded during this intense two-week period will always be treasured reminders for us of a brief, bucolic window of artistic fulfilment during a terribly challenging period for the world’ said James Ehnes.

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Ehnes Quartet – Beethoven: String Quartets Nos. 10 & 11 (2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 50:19 minutes | 923 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © PM Classics Ltd.

This, the third in the series of Beethoven’s late quartets from the Ehnes Quartet deviates from the official ‘late’ works to include the last two of Beethoven’s ‘middle period’ quartets: The sunny and amiable E flat, known as the ‘Harp’, and the terse and irascible F Minor, known not surprisingly, as ‘Serioso’.

Beethoven had a habit of working on two works of wildly differing emotional ranges at the same time – never more clearly illustrated as in these two masterly quartets.

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Ehnes Quartet – Beethoven: String Quartet No. 13, Op. 130 & Grosse Fuge, Op. 133 (2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 57:48 minutes | 1,05 GB | Genre: Quatuors
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © PM Classics Ltd.

Like many musical projects planned for 2020, the plans of the Ehnes Quartet to record Beethoven’s late quartets underwent a drastic revision. Rather than cancel the project, some ingenious technology was employed. James Ehnes takes up the story ‘Our quartet was greatly looking forward to a week of recording in the United Kingdom in August 2020, but the COVID-19 pandemic made it impossible for us to travel to the UK, and for our UK-based producer, Simon Kiln, to travel to us. We were, however, able to take advantage of the wonders of modern technology by recording in the USA with Simon (producer Simon Kiln) monitoring the sessions in real time in London A fortunate benefit of not traveling overseas for these recordings was that the days we had scheduled for travel become additional recording days, allowing us to record all of Beethoven’s string quartets from Op. 74 onwards. The four CD’s we recorded during this intense two-week period will always be treasured reminders for us of a brief, bucolic window of artistic fulfilment during a terribly challenging period for the world’.

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Ehnes Quartet – Beethoven: String Quartets Nos.15 & 16 (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:08:09 minutes | 1,22 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © PM Classics Ltd.

This is the final of four installments in the Ehnes Quartet’s survey of the late Beethoven Quartets. It was recorded in the US with their producer overseeing the sessions from London as the pandemic halted travel plans and sessions were canceled. “The albums we recorded during this intense two-week period will always be treasured reminders for us of a brief, bucolic window of artistic fulfillment during a terribly challenging period for the world,” said James Ehnes. They bring to these masterworks many years of experience.

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