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See Terms & Conditions for p&p rates. | |  | Dvorak & Schumann: Piano Quintet
Schumann’s Piano Quintet, composed in the autumn of 1842, was one of the earliest examples of the combination of piano with a string quartet – Boccherini, Dussek and Hummel had each produced one, and Schubert used the double bass in his ‘Trout’ Quintet. It instantly became one of Schumann’s most popular works. It was composed at a time of almost feverish industry – he composed his three string quartets Op.41, the Piano Quartet and a set of Fantasy Pieces for piano trio, all in 1842. The piano quintet is a captivating, almost spontaneous work, and is a brilliant example of Schumann’s inspiration from start to finish. Dvorák’s Op.81 Piano Quintet stems from his attempt to revise an earlier piano quintet in A major from 1872. Dissatisfied with this work, he set upon composing a new one: the result composed in September 1887 is one of his most lovable works. A relentlessly sunny work, sometimes sentimental, always masterful. “The qualities of both quintets are relished by Biss and the Elias players in these lively performances, though sometimes the balance — always tricky in this medium — favours the piano too much” Sunday Times, 30th September 2012 “playing of wonderful exuberance and fire in both works...these superb players could almost convince you Schumann was looking out on a cloudless sky when he wrote it.” The Observer, 7th October 2012 “the ensemble is meticulously precise and the Elias’s intonation spotlessly clean” The Strad, December 2012 “As a pairing of the most popular piano quintets, this disc would make a useful Christmas stocking-filler. The interpretations are clean and unfussy.” Financial Times, 16th November 2012 “highly assured performances of these two marvellous chamber works...this warmly recorded performance is most compelling when Schumann explores the extrovert side of his musical personality...While there are some caveats about the Schumann, the Biss/Elias partnership produces a wonderful performance of the Dvorak, conveying not only the freshness of its invention but also probing darker melancholic undercurrents.” BBC Music Magazine, Christmas 2012 ***** “From the very opening, the almost imperceptible variation of pulse suggests an intimate engagement with this music...This music thrives in performances of individuality and character...and that's what Biss/Elias offer in abundance. It's Schumann Quintet to place among the best of the rest and a Dvorak that I simply couldn't stop listening to.” Gramophone Magazine, December 2012 “one of the most enjoyable and compelling chamber recordings released this year” International Record Review, December 2012 | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Elias String Quartet play Haydn & Schumann
Elias String Quartet: Sara Bitlloch, Donald Grant (violins), Martin Saving (viola) & Marie Bitlloch (cello) The Elias String Quartet returns to Wigmore Hall Live with a much anticipated disc of Haydn and Schumann, recorded live in concert, September 2010. Formed at the Royal Northern College of Music in 1998, the ensemble quickly became established among the leading quartets performing internationally today, and is now supported by the prestigious Wigmore Hall Emerging Talent scheme. Widely praised for the vibrancy and intensity of its performances, the quartet has received particular critical acclaim for recent recordings, and in April 2010 its disc of Mendelssohn, Mozart and Schubert on the Wigmore Hall Live label [WHLIVE0028] received the BBC Music Magazine Newcomer Award. “It's a fascinating programme: the Haydn features a dazzling presto finale brimming with theatrical gaiety and virtuoso flair, while the Schumann is explored with marvellous collective vigour and sensitivity – the pulsing drive of both the scherzo and the finale disguising the deft lightness of the bowing.” The Independent, 13th April 2012 “They make a beautiful sound, burnished yet translucent, and play with vigour and subtlety. On the strength of these performances, I find their fluid, yielding style more suited to Schumann than to Haydn...The Schumann is a delight.” Sunday Times, 3rd June 2012 “a keen feeling for musical character, immaculate ensemble, lively articulation and just the right degree of vibration to ensure both warmth and clarity of sound...the Elias genuinely catch the ardent waywardness of Schumann spirit. They also make something mesmeric of the sudden, still, drone-based episode near the end of the rustic-style finale.” BBC Music Magazine, August 2012 **** “Slender tone, soft, delicate and withdrawn greets you at the start of Schumann's first Quartet, the Introduzione played Andante espressivo as instructed. The Elias String Quartet observe the metronome marking ((as they do in the other movements too) but there isn't a hint of rigidity...the Elias make their points and there is no lack of variety in mood” Gramophone Magazine, October 2012 | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Xuefei Yang plays Bach Concertos
The Beijing-born guitarist Xuefei Yang has recorded her first album of baroque music, an all-Bach programme anchored by three concertos newly arranged for guitar and string quartet. Bach Concertos is an exciting, innovative album in which she has transcribed for the guitar some of Bach’s familiar violin concertos and other works, hoping to establish these new arrangements as noteworthy repertoire for the guitar and to expand the concerto repertoire for that instrument. Xuefei complements the concertante repertoire with solo guitar arrangements of the Violin Sonata No. 1 BWV 1001, the Prelude in C Major from the Well-Tempered Clavier BWV 846 and the Air on a G string from the Orchestral Suite in D major BWV 1068. Xuefei, whose international career finds her on the prestigious stages of the Wigmore Hall, Southbank Centre, Royal Albert Hall, Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), Philharmonie (Berlin), Konzerthaus (Vienna) and Lincoln Center (New York), as well as to other major concert halls of Europe, North America and Asia, hopes that the new concerto arrangements will become established additions to the repertoire for her instrument. “In the baroque concerto repertoire,” she says, we only really have Vivaldi Concertos, which are very light in nature. These Bach concertos would be a substantial and significant addition to the guitar repertoire and may create new opportunities to bring the instrument to a wider musical audience.” Explaining the background to her latest recording, Xuefei said, “In Bach’s time, the modern guitar had not yet been invented but a close relative, the lute, was a popular instrument. Bach wrote quite a few works for solo lute and they have become core repertoire for guitarists. When I was playing the wonderful solo violin works by Bach, I wondered whether his concertos would work on the guitar too. So I found the scores and, to my delight, I found that they did!” The three concertos at the heart of the recording are those for Violin in A minor BWV 1041 and E Major BWV 1042 and for Harpsichord in D minor BWV 1052. Xuefei performs them with the Elias String Quartet. “The composer's own lute transcriptions are her models and she finds ingenious means to overcome the problems introduced when recasting, say, a bowed violin line for the plucked guitar...While the challenges of adapting the concertos for guitar may not have been entirely surmounted, it would be worthwhile to hear Xuefei Yang in more solo music by Bach.” Gramophone Magazine, May 2012 | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Britten - String Quartets Nos. 2 & 3
“The Elias is the best young quartet I’ve come across in years.” Paul Driver, Sunday Times, Nov. 2009 The Quartet was formed in 1998 at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, working regularly with the late Dr. Christopher Rowland, and subsequently studying at the Hochschule in Cologne with the Alban Berg quartet. The Quartet received second prize and the Sidney Griller prize at the 9th London International String Quartet Competition in 2003 and were finalists in the Paolo Borciani Competition in 2005. The Elias String Quartet have performed extensively in the UK, at the Wigmore Hall, Purcell Room, Snape Maltings, Kettle’s Yard, Bridgewater Hall, Turner Sims and Fairfield Halls. They have also toured widely, playing at the Stockholm Concert Hall, the Auditorium du Louvre, Paris, and Jordan Hall, Boston, as well as in Germany, Austria, Italy, Australia and the USA. The Quartet have broadcast live on national radio in the UK, France, Australia and Sweden. From 2005-9 the Elias were String Quartet in Residence at Sheffield’s Music in the Round as part of the Ensemble 360, taking over from the Lindsay Quartet. The Elias Quartet were recently selected to join BBC Radio 3’s New Generation Artists scheme. Future engagements include concerts at the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam and Carnegie Hall, New York. “Almost nothing in Britten's output compares with the visionary, shadowy yet gleaming fifth movement of Quartet No 3 (1975), written when he was dying...These players do it magnificent justice, playing with virtuosity and intensity.” The Observer, 28th March 2010 “These newcomers...have plenty to offer. I particularly like the variety of colour and meaning they bring to the transformations of the Second Quartet's opening motif...there's plenty of passion and a strong feeling for shape.” BBC Music Magazine, May 2010 **** “These are highly sensitive, touching performances...there is a wonderful pensiveness here and a real appreciation of the beauty of sound and colour, aided by a fine recording...these lyrical Elias performances remind us [Britten] was primarily a composer of vocal music...Nobody who buys this new disc is likely to regret it.” Gramophone Magazine, June 2010 “Having revealed themselves as superb exponents of Mendelssohn’s music, the Elias players now seem natural Brittenists, but the styles are not without their common features: clarity, economy, lyrical decisiveness, faultless technique.” Sunday Times, 2nd May 2010 **** “The Elias String Quartet highlight the germs of greatness in this apparently decorative music – the eerie harmonics and brute malice...Sophisticated phrasing, subtle colouring and impeccable tuning .” The Independent on Sunday, 6th June 2010 “The Elias Quartet catches the powerful emotional undercurrents superbly. The colours, the subtlety of the sounds and the sensitivity of the playing are telling, and in Britten’s Second Quartet...they show that they’re not afraid to explore the violence of the central Vivace, making it snap and bristle with positively Bartok-ian physicality.” Andrew McGregor, bbc.co.uk, 7th June 2010  CD Review
Critics' Disc of the Year - December 2010 |
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| |  | Elias String Quartet
Live from Wigmore Hall - 29 December 2008 Described as “quite exceptional” (Gramophone) and a group that is “poetic, charismatic and virtuosic” (Sunday Telegraph), the Elias String Quartet is considered one of the most fresh and exciting quartets of their generation. As their career continues to grow with extraordinary momentum, Wigmore Hall Live is proud to release this live recital recording that captures the young quartet’s fervent passion and infectious enthusiasm for the music of Mendelssohn, Mozart and Schubert. WHLive0028 opens with Schubert’s great unfinished work, the Quartettsatz in C minor, considered to be the forerunner of the late great string quartets for which Schubert is best remembered. This is followed by possibly the most famous of Mozart’s string quartets, the ‘'Dissonance’ quartet, dedicated to Joseph Haydn. The programme ends with string quartets by Felix Mendelssohn - the composer they hold most dear. With 2009 being Mendelssohn’s bicentenary year, the Elias String Quartet chose these works in order to showcase a side of the composer’s genius which they believe is highly underrated. After winning all the Royal Northern College of Music quartet awards, they spent a year studying with the Alban Berg Quartet in Cologne. They have since received many honours at major international competitions, including multiple awards at the 2003 London International String Quartet Competition. Donald Grant plays the violin that used to belong to their ‘founding father’, Christopher Rowland, who died in 2007. Press acclaim for the Elias String Quartet at Wigmore Hall “A heaven-storming performance … Big things lie ahead of them” The Strad “four powerful personalities at work … The Elias are a quite exceptional quartet” Gramophone “The emotional chemistry here was manifestly unusual … pure magic” The Sunday Telegraph “the players more than deserved the standing ovation from an audience among whose numbers even the hardened professionals and most impassive critics were moved and impressed” The Independent “The players are individually brilliant, but their interplay is profound, and it is no doubt significant that first violin and cello, melody and bass, are sisters (Sara and Marie Bitlloch). The recording is ideally balanced for a string quartet.” Sunday Times, 10th May 2009 **** “The soaring performance of Mendelssohn's E minor String Quartet Op 44 No 2 alone justifies the cost of this CD. The impassioned opening, crisp scherzo, song-like andante and urgent agitato finale make it among the composer's most satisfying works, here warmly played.” The Observer, 26th April 2009 “…the players capture beautifully the mix of grace and jokiness in the Mozart Minuet, and in the Mendelssohn they apply just enough rubato to give colour and meaning, without ever interrupting the flow. The final Presto agitato is a tour de force, rightly acclaimed by the audience.” BBC Music Magazine, October 2009 ***** “The Elias Quartet offer many delights and stand comparison with the greats. …in the Quartettsatz they revel in the Viennese charm… and find time to grow the phrases quite beautifully. In the Dissonance… there are plentiful examples of their fine musicianship, particularly in the slow movement, where their individuality comes to the fore. In Mendelssohn's Fourth Quartet... Sara Bitllock's delectable tone leading the way in the extensive first movement and the piece's underlying unease never underplayed. The Mendelssohn encore is a delightful bonus.” Gramophone Magazine, October 2009 | | | Usually despatched in 3 - 4 working days. |
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Gramophone Magazine
BBC Music Magazine Awards 2010