Andrés Isasi - String Quartets, Vol. 2 (Isasi Quartet)

Information

Composer: Andrés Isasi

• String Quartet No. 4 in D Major, Op. 31
• String Quartet No. 3 in E Minor, Op. 30
• Aria in D Major
• Scherzetto in F Minor
• Preludio in A Major, Op. 51, No. 1, "Jinete de Abril"

Isasi Quartet

    Annick Roussin, violin

    Anna Bohigas, violin

    Karsten Dobers, viola

    Yvan Chiffoleau, cello

Date: 2013

Label: Naxos

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Review

The Basque composer Andrés Isasi (1890-1940) started writing eight string quartets. Only four, perhaps five, were finished, four (Nos 2 5) within a concentrated two-year period in 1920 21. Their numbering and cataloguing is haphazard, with No ‘0’ in E minor (1908) listed as Op 83, while No 2 in A minor – with which it is coupled on the previous volume of the series – bears the opus number 11 (No 1 in G major, Op 11, to follow presumably on the third and final volume with No 5, dates from 1911). The incomplete Sixth and Seventh have no opus numbers at all.

Isasi’s style is gently late Romantic, anachronistically so for the 1920s, but the works are well put together (he studied in Berlin with Humperdinck) and have a true sense of dialogue. In four conventional, well-defined movements, the Fourth runs – in this performance – for just under 30 minutes. The Third lasts but 20, its three spans following a moderately paced faster-slow format. The style is only palely Spanish, lacking the vivacity of Falla or Gerhard. The brief couplings are entertaining trifles, the Aria possibly a lost movement of the fragmentary, undated Seventh.

The Isasi Quartet have changed half their line-up since the first volume, with cellist Yvan Chiffoleau replacing Matthias Weinmann, Anna Bohigas dropping down to second violin and newcomer Annick Roussin becoming leader. The performances are still executed as well as the previous group although intonation is a touch edgier than before. Naxos’s sound is cool and natural.

— Guy Rickards

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Andrés Isasi (29 October 1890 – 6 April 1940) was a Spanish composer. Born in Bilbao, he moved to Berlin in 1909 to study with Karl Kämpf and Humperdinck, developing skill in large-scale musical forms, especially the symphonic poem. His works, which found more appreciation in Hungary and Germany than in Spain, shows strong Basque influences and solid academic training. Isasi composed two symphonies, several orchestral suites and symphonic poems, a Piano Concerto, chamber works including eight string quartets, and many songs. He died of a heart condition in 1940 at his home in Algorta.

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Founded in 2009, the Isasi Quartet focuses on composers who lived at stylistic crossroads, reflecting the ensemble's own multicultural identity. They first recorded the string quartets of Andrés Isasi, whose music blends German symphonism with Mediterranean lyricism. They later turned to the works of Henri Marteau, marked by French expressiveness and German structural clarity. The quartet's recordings, released on Naxos and CPO, have been featured on major European radio stations. The group performs widely at European festivals, earning particular acclaim for a 2015 concert at Bilbao's Philharmonic Society.

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