Music Lane

It's all about the music, dude! Sit down, relax and listen to some tunes.

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". . . the Concord actually plays out of tune. So what!"

Posted by Chris from Lafayette on January 11, 2016 at 12:13:00:
I haven't heard the Concord performance(s), but I wouldn't be too quick to defend out-of-tune playing. You didn't mention the Lindsays, but that's another group which is notorious (at least to some of us) for its frequently cavalier attitude towards intonation. The stereo Budapest Quartet performances was another set which I found sometimes problematical WRT intonation.

I haven't heard the Busch performances in many years, but I don't remember noticing that their playing was particularly out of tune. Of course, you have to watch those off-center holes on your LP's. ;-) (In general, I liked the Busch performances, but the lower-fi level of their engineering led me to replace their recordings with more modern performances which I thought were every bit as good as the Busch performances but with far more realistic SQ.)

Another pre-stereo set which I still have (via the Testament CD reissues - I used to have Op. 127 only on LP) is the one by the Hollywood Quartet, a group who obviously paid attention to weighting and balance of the textures (not that other groups don't do this too, but I feel the the Hollywood Quartet was noticeably successful in doing so). At the same time, I feel that the equalization of the remaster is not quite right, producing a very slight tubbiness in the bass, whereas I really want more clarity in that region of the frequency spectrum.

I used to have the Quartetto Italiano performances on LP - I loved Harris Goldsmith's description of them as "the Stokowski of chamber music"! So, in keeping with that description, I loved most of all the sheer tonal beauty of their playing. After awhile though, I began to feel that their tempi were sometimes on the too-comfortable side, so I never obtained the CD resissues. If I could find the set at a give-away price however, I'd probably spring for it.

I've posted before about the Smetanas - I like their last (digital) recordings of the early and middle quartets, but, by the time they recorded the late quartets in digital, Jiri Novak, the first violinist, was losing some of his control of pitch and tone quality. So in the case of the Smetana renditions of the late quartets, I prefer their earlier (analogue) recordings on Supraphon (dating from the 60's AFAIR).

Another group that I like from that era is the Bartok Quartet - I used to have their recordings on LP and I replaced the LP's with the CD reissues (all except for Op. 95!). Tough and uncompromising - but also in tune!

OTOH, I have NOT kept up with most of the latest performances of Op. 132, aside from the Belcea Quartet perfromances from a couple of years ago, which I heard on Spotify. (I thought they seemed excellent based on my casual listening.) Even aside from the newer recordings of this repertoire, there are SO many recordings of these works I have NOT heard.

My favorite recording of the Beethoven Quartets right now (not least for SQ!) is the one by the Prazak Quartet on the Praga label. They're another group which made a recording of the late quartets right near the beginning of the CD era (on the Nuova Era label), and I was struck by how they seemed to take account of so many aspects of the music at such a satisfying and detailed level: the technical (including intonation!), the spiritual (kind of an iffy category, since my concept of spirituality might not be the same as yours, and vice versa), the textural balance and contrast, etc. The newer Praga performances seem slightly (and JUST slightly) less tight with the intonation, but they're even better recorded, and they're my go-to performances at the present time.

Another fascinating complete set I have is by the Auryn Quartet on the Tacet label, which uses the multi-channel capabilities of DVD-Audio to place the listener at the very center of the four instruments. So by fiddling with your balance controls, your can highlight a particular part if you want to isolate it and study it - a great way to get to know the textural details!