Takacs Quartet

Takács Quartet, Clarice Assad and Julien Labro – Takacs Assad Labro (2024) [Official Digital Download 24bit/88,2kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · March 11, 2024 · Comments off

My friend Clarice Assad called me out of the blue a few months after our album Confessions earned a GRAMMY® nomination. Clarice had written the title tracks on the album, which Laura Strickling sang magnificently. “Bob,” Clarice said, “I have an idea….” I have learned that anytime Clarice has an idea, I’m interested. “I wrote a piece for Takács Quartet and bandoneón virtuoso Julien Labro. It’s a wild piece. The five of them have been performing it all over the world on tour, and I think you would like it. Actually, I know you would like it. Julien also wrote a companion piece, and the third work is by Bryce Dessner. I think you know Bryce; he lives in Paris. What a trio!” I responded that it sounded wonderful. “I want you to record these three works, plus another piece I have in mind for violin and piano. When can we do it?” Hence began one of Yarlung’s most adventurous (and I hope you will agree, successful) collaborations in the label’s nineteen year history.

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Garrick Ohlsson, Takács Quartet – Elgar & Beach: Piano Quintets (2019) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 12, 2023 · Comments off

Amy Beach’s piano quintet proved a deservedly popular success in its early years. It makes a compelling—and surprising—match for Elgar’s own piano quintet: a late work contemporary with the cello concerto, and which inhabits the same emotional landscape.

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Takacs Quartet – Beethoven Complete String Quartets (2017) [Official Digital Download 24bit/48kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 12, 2023 · Comments off

Since its formation in 1975, the Takács Quartet has been recognized as one of the world’s leading string quartets. Their award-winning recordings include the complete Beethoven String Quartets for Decca, recorded between 2002 and 2004. Decca Classics celebrates the acclaimed quartet with this multi-media presentation of the Beethoven quartets on 7 CD and a 104-page booklet.

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Takács Quartet – Felix & Fanny Mendelssohn: String Quartets (2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · August 31, 2023 · Comments off

Felix’s impassioned F minor quartet was the ﬁercely personal response to his sister’s death in 1847, only a few months before his own. The Takács Quartet frame it with equally committed accounts of a much earlier work, and Fanny’s own important contribution to the genre.

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Takács Quartet – Dvořák: String Quartet, Op. 106; Coleridge-Taylor: Fantasiestücke (2023) [Official Digital Download 24bit/192kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · August 31, 2023 · Comments off

Dvořák’s mature string quartets are masterly, all brimming with life-enhancing music, and Op 106 is no exception. The Takács Quartet gives superlative accounts of both this and the apt coupling by a young Samuel Coleridge-Taylor.

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Takács Quartet – Hough, Dutilleux & Ravel: String Quartets (2023) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · February 6, 2023 · Comments off

If this premiere recording of Stephen Hough’s String Quartet No 1 may be regarded as definitive―the work is dedicated to the Takács Quartet―those of the quartets by Ravel and Dutilleux are no less distinguished.

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Marc-André Hamelin, Takács Quartet – Franck: Piano Quintet; Debussy: String Quartet (2016) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

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

Franck’s Piano Quintet and Debussy’s String Quartet make an apt and unusual coupling, each work its composer’s only, unsurpassable, contribution to the genre. Both receive authoritative performances from Marc-André Hamelin and the Takács Quartet.

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Takács Quartet – Britten: String Quartets Nos 1, 2 & 3 (2013) [Official Digital Download 24bit/88,2kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · September 13, 2022 · Comments off

Takács Quartet - Britten: String Quartets Nos 1, 2 & 3 (2013) [Official Digital Download 24bit/88,2kHz] Download

‘Arguably the greatest string quartet before the public today’ (The Sunday Times), the Takács Quartet have recorded much of the great Classical and Romantic quartet repertoire during their fruitful career. Now they turn to three masterpieces of the twentieth century.

The three quartets span the composer’s life, the first written in America and the second written at the height of Britten’s fame after the premiere of Peter Grimes. It was written to commemorate the 250th anniversary of Purcell’s death—a composer who was a lifetime inspiration to Britten—and the last movement is cast in the form of a huge Chacony. The third Quartet was written at the end of Britten’s life and refers specifically to his last opera, Death in Venice. Peter Pears described this haunting work as being ‘of a profound beauty more touching than anything else, radiant, wise, new, mysterious—overwhelming’.
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