Mieczysław Weinberg - String Quartets Vol. 5 (Quatuor Danel)

Information

Composer: Mieczysław Weinberg

• String Quartet No. 1 in C major, Op. 2
• String Quartet No. 3 in D minor, Op. 14
• String Quartet No. 10 in A minor, Op. 85
• Capriccio, Op. 11
• Aria, Op. 9

Quatuor Danel

    Marc Danel, violin

    Gilles Millet, violin

    Vlad Bogdanas, viola

    Guy Danel, cello

Date: 2011

Label: CPO

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Review

When reviewing the Danels’ first two instalments (3/08, 2/09), I was as impressed by their preparation and absorption in Weinberg’s idiom, and Arnd Coppers’s fine sound, as I was by the music itself. Encountering the fifth disc (only Quartets Nos 2, 12 and 17 remain, by my reckoning), I can confirm that there has been no fall-off in quality. The sound is beautifully balanced, close without being overbearing, the playing a model for any aspiring quartet (try the Third’s hushed central Andante sostenuto or the delicate opening of No 10’s Scherzo).

These five pieces offer a fascinating, rarely viewed glimpse into his early output and – in the extensively revised First Quartet – how he might have developed had the Second World War not forced him from his native Poland. Weinberg’s First (1937) stands apart from the rest of the series in several ways, for instance in Szymanowski’s benign influence – most clearly heard in the central Andante tranquillo – and in its thoroughgoing recomposition in the 1980s in which the experienced quartet composer slickened up his first attempt. The brief Aria (1942) and playful Capriccio (1943) are also products of his pre-Shostakovich period, written in Tashkent before the move to Moscow.

It is in the Third that we fully encounter the familiar Weinberg, not least in its unusual formal design with its opening Presto bursting at the seams and closing, hushed Allegretto musing on its single theme (the work was recast and reordered many years later as the Second Chamber Symphony). The Tenth (1964) is the real masterpiece, though, a four-span-in-one design that is wholly satisfying structurally and expressively without the whimsical designs of some of its successors. Another excellent disc.

— Guy Rickards

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Mieczysław Weinberg (8 December 1919 – 26 February 1996) was a Polish-born Soviet and Russian composer and pianist. Born in Warsaw to a family connected with Yiddish theatre, he fled Poland in 1939 following the German invasion and settled in the Soviet Union, where he gained the support of Dmitri Shostakovich. Weinberg became a prolific and respected composer, particularly during the 1960s, when his concert and film music achieved considerable recognition. His later years were marked by declining health and reduced official support. International appreciation of his music grew significantly in the 1990s.

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Quatuor Danel is a French/Belgian string quartet established in June 1991. The ensemble has worked with the Amadeus Quartet, the Borodin Quartet, as well as members of the Beethoven Quartet and the LaSalle Quartet. Known for classical, early modern and contemporary repertoire, they tour internationally and have an extensive discography. They have both recorded and performed the first complete cycle of string quartets by Mieczysław Weinberg, as well as a complete cycle of the quartets of Dmitri Shostakovich. Since 2005, the Danel has been "Quartet in Residence" at the University of Manchester.

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