This String Quartet has some technical difficulties particularly for the first violinist but the musical result is worth the effort and players familiar with Beethoven's quartets will enjoy playing it. It is one of three Hummel opus 30 quartets published by SJ Music. All three are classical in style and pleasurable to listen to and play and many would say that they have been unjustly neglected. Johann Nepomuk Hummel was a Hungarian pianist conductor and composer born in Pozsony (now Bratislava) in 1778. He died in Weimar in 1837. Mozart heard him play aged seven in Vienna and was so impressed that he offered him lessons and took him to live with him for the next two years.As an adult in Vienna he became good friends with Beethoven.

This String Quartet has some technical difficulties particularly for the first violinist but the musical result is worth the effort and players familiar with Beethoven's quartets will enjoy playing it. It is one of three Hummel opus 30 quartets published by SJ Music. All three are classical in style and pleasurable to listen to and play and many would say that they have been unjustly neglected. Johann Nepomuk Hummel was a Hungarian pianist conductor and composer born in Pozsony (now Bratislava) in 1778. He died in Weimar in 1837. Mozart heard him play aged seven in Vienna and was so impressed that he offered him lessons and took him to live with him for the next two years.As an adult in Vienna he became good friends with Beethoven.

10 Fugues For String Quartet Vol. 2-The idea for these arrangements came to me whilst listening to the Hagen Quartet's beautiful recording of the fugues that form part of Haydn's 'Sun Quartets' Op. 20. The spirit and influence of J.S. Bach in particular his Well Tempered Clavier Book II courses through these three miraculous Haydn fugues. Like the viol consort the string quartet suits this kind of composition (the fugue) with all four instruments sufficiently similar in character to each other to match the extraordinary unity and economy of the counterpoint. A string quartet playing Bach fugues is a good example of a harmonious relationship between form andcontent: just as there is a unifying principle behind the construction of the four string instruments so there is (usually) a single theme or subject that unifies the construction of a four-part fugue. Thus the form enacts the content telling you something about the text and message within. Apart from Haydn's and a handful of other composers' wondrous creations there's little fugal writing for string quartet at least in comparison with the abundance of other forms. This was another reason to make these arrangements. The quartet offers a melodic independence impossible to achieve on a single instrument. And I believe the technical and interpretative challenges posed by this repertoire – lightness of sound and rhythmic fluidity for example - will be very valuable to quartets seeking the holy grail: a unified sound. Perhaps the simplest and most compelling reason for this work is that I just love this music more than I can say. These dazzling pieces mostly fast bright and in major keys show Bach at his most playful funny and mischievous composing for an instrument rarely associated with these qualities. And so I'm very happy to offer string quartets these little know fugues written by my favourite composer - a violinist and violist himself but above all a master

in E flat major. Par STEFANI JAN. Composition was completed at the beginning of 1825, in stylistic terms it falls between Classicism and Romanticism. The straddling of stylistic epochs is evident in the four-movement design of the quartet, which refers do Classical solutions established during the previous centrury also in other genres. Nethertheles, it is worth drawing attention to the third movement, the minuet, which represented something of a testing ground for contrasting tradition with progress, history with the present, and formal with frivolous, which these popular dances may have symbolised. Stylistic hanges heading towards Romanticism are evident also in the way the work's melodic layer is organise. The Józef Stefani's advanced compositional skills prove his crucial contribution to the evolution of the string quartet on Polish soil. And the catchy melodic phases - for which Stefani ceirtanly had a gift - will stir the emotions of a many listener. / Date parution : 2023-06-01/ Répertoire / Quatuor à Cordes