Jón Leifs - String Quartets (Yggdrasil Quartet)

Information

Composer: Jón Leifs

• Mors et vita. Quartetto I, Op. 21
• Vita et mors. Quartetto II, Op. 36
• El Greco. Quartetto III, Op. 64

Yggdrasil Quartet

    Fredrik Paulsson, violin

    Per Öman, violin

    Robert Westlund, viola

    Per Nyström, cello

Date: 1994

Label: BIS

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Jón Leifs (1 May 1899 – 30 July 1968) was an Icelandic composer, pianist and conductor. Born in Iceland, he left for Germany in 1916 to study at the Leipzig Conservatory, graduating in 1921. During this period he also encountered Ferruccio Busoni, who urged him to "follow his own path in composition". Beginning with piano arrangements of Icelandic folk songs, Leifs started an active career as a composer in the 1920s. In 1945 he moved back to Iceland, and became a fierce proponent of music education and of artists' rights. Most of his works is inspired by Icelandic natural phenomena and classic Icelandic sagas.

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The Yggdrasil Quartet emerged as one of the most exciting new string quartets in the 1990s and has become a champion of new quartet music in Europe. Its members studied at the same time at the Royal Academy of Music in Stockholm, then went on to further studies with Hungarian composer György Kurtag and with violinist Norbert Brainin, leader of the Amadeus Quartet. They rapidly gained an international reputation as prizewinners in both the London International String Quartet Competition and the Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition. The Quartet made several recordings for BIS Records.

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