Various Composers - Uncovered, Vol. 3 (Catalyst Quartet)

Information

• Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson - String Quartet No. 1 "Calvary"
• William Grant Still - Lyric Quartette
• George Walker - String Quartet No. 1 "Lyric"

Catalyst Quartet

    Karla Donehew Perez, violin

    Abi Fayette, violin

    Paul Laraia, viola

    Karlos Rodriguez, cello

Date: 2023

Label: Azica Records

https://azica.com/albums/uncovered-vol-3-coleridge-taylor-perkinson-william-grant-still-george-walker/

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Review

The first two recordings in the Catalyst Quartet’s project exploring and, in most cases, introducing music by Black composers focused on one creative figure apiece: Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (4/21) and Florence Price (3/22). The ensemble’s newest release spotlights three Americans – Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson (unrelated to his British namesake), William Grant Still and George Walker – who also struggled to receive the attention their music was due. Thanks to the Catalyst, a significant gap in the repertoire is slowly being filled.

All of the concise, three-movement string quartets on the third volume were finished in the 1940s and ’50s, and they are welcome. At least one is partly familiar: Walker’s String Quartet No 1 (1946), known as the Lyric, contains a tender slow movement that has received many performances in an expanded version as Lyric for Strings. The rest of the score is equally affecting and inventive, showing the twenty-something Walker already to be a composer of exceptional skill.

Still’s Lyric Quartet, written during 1939‑45 and published in 1960 with the subtitle ‘Musical Portraits of Three Friends’, abounds in poetic and jaunty activity. Its engaging conversations include an Incan melody that provides impetus for the slow movement. Similar warmth and vitality pervade Perkinson’s String Quartet No 1 (1956), whose subtitle, Calvary, denotes the Spiritual that underlies the absorbing narrative.

As on their two previous recordings in the series, the Catalyst musicians perform with intense vitality and finesse, making bold cases for works that deserve to be regular concert fare.

-- Donald Rosenberg, Gramophone

More reviews:
https://www.ft.com/content/c2b25c8a-a523-40e6-b01d-fa328a43845d

https://www.classical-music.com/reviews/chamber/uncovered-vol-3-catalyst-quartet

https://www.allmusic.com/album/release/uncovered-vol-3-coleridge-taylor-perkinson-george-walker-william-grant-still-mr0005962651

https://www.wrti.org/wrti-spotlight/2023-02-07/album-of-the-week-catalyst-quartet-uncovered-vol-3-coleridge-taylor-perkinson-george-walker-william-grant-still

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The Catalyst Quartet was founded by the internationally acclaimed Sphinx Organization in 2010. The Quartet has toured widely throughout the US and abroad, including sold-out performances at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., Chicago’s Harris Theater, Miami’s New World Center, and Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage at Carnegie Hall in New York. The Catalyst Quartet’s recordings span the ensemble’s scope of interests and artistry. Its largest ongoing project, UNCOVERED, is a set of albums on Azica Records that celebrates composers of color whose works have been overlooked by the traditional canon.

https://catalystquartet.com/

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