Schubert: String Quartet No. 14 "Death and the Maiden" & Sibelius: String Quartet "Intimate Voices" Ehnes Quartet

• Franz Schubert (1797-1828): String Quartet No. 14 in D Minor, D. 810 Death and the Maiden:
• 1 I. Allegro 15:35
• 2 II. Andante con moto 13:24
• 3 III. Scherzo. Allegro molto 04:12
• 4 IV. Presto – Prestissimo 09:08
• Jean Sibelius (1865-1957): String Quartet in D Minor, Op. 56 Intimate Voices:
• 5 I. Andante – Allegro molto moderato 06:22
• 6 II. Vivace 02:38
• 7 III. Adagio di molto 11:11
• 8 IV. Allegretto (ma pesante) 06:02
• 9 V. Allegro 05:25
• Total Runtime 01:13:57

Info zu Schubert: String Quartet No. 14 "Death and the Maiden" & Sibelius: String Quartet "Intimate Voices"

Death preyed heavily on the minds of both Schubert and Sibelius when they were composing the two string quartets on this new recording from the Ehnes Quartet. Sibelius had undergone several operations to remove a tumour in his throat. The bleak and highly personal 4th Symphony is the masterwork from this period, but the string quartet ‘Intimate Voices’ of 1908 should not be underestimated. Taut and highly concentrated, it has an almost Haydnesque construction, and the quartet’s first movement’s sheer perfection of form approaches that of the 3rd Symphony’s opening movement. "I am the most unhappy and wretched creature in the world…whose health will never be right again" wrote Schubert to a friend in 1824. With his emotions veering from happy memories of earlier years to shuddering terror at the prospect of death, he composed two string quartets and the Octet over a two- month period. The D minor quartet makes ingenious use of his earlier song ‘Death and the Maiden’ from 1817 in the slow movement’s variations. ‘Give me your hand, you fair and gentle creature; I am a friend and do not come to punish’ sings Death soothingly. The music captures Schubert’s fearful state of mind in a remarkable ‘freeze frame’ effect.

“From the opening chord, firm, precise, pliant, this quartet knows its collective mind when it comes to Schubert’s much loved “Death and the Maiden”...They avoid exaggerating the Viennese lilt, keeping all light, muscular and buoyant.” (The Observer)

Ehnes Quartet

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