Janacek: String Quartet No. 2 'Intimate Letters'

“The Lindsays deliver highly volatile emotionally charged accounts of the two Janacek Quartets. Dvorak's charming Cypresses provides warmly lyrical relief.” BBC Music Magazine, April 2011 ****

“This is something very special . . . an outstanding release” CD Review

“At every stage, these performances command attention and serve Janácek's highly personal agenda superbly. Quite rightly, the performers recognise the near-operatic quality of much of the writing, reaching an apogee of expressiveness in the finale of the Second Quartet. Martinu's Madrigals for violin and viola, played with a clear understanding of the lineage they bear with Janácek, make an excellent makeweight.” BBC Music Magazine, July 2009 *****

“The performances here have the sovereign control and the perfect weighting of each line in the musical argument that are the group's trademarks.” The Guardian, 15th May 2009 ***

“Live performances of the Janácek quartets, with a vehemence and rawness which seem try to the extreme emotions of the elderly composer. The Dvorák fill-up is lovely but irrelevant.” BBC Music Magazine, January 2009 ****

“…what is immediately striking about the present performance is its boldness and originality in terms of tempo contrasts, rhythmic emphasis and textural variety. Not only the playing beyond reproach on technical grounds, but also, more importantly, it conveys with almost graphic immediacy the searing passion the 74-year-old composer felt for Kamila Stösslová. The performers demonstrate a similarly convincing capacity to bring imagery to life in the remarkable Second Quartet by the Janácek pupil Pavel Haas.” BBC Music Magazine, October 2006 *****

“The catalogue is not short of recommendable versions of Janácek's IntimateLetters Quartet. But there are any number of ways of bringing its hyper-passionate declarations off the page, and this young Czech quartet have plenty of ideas of their own about that. Once or twice that leads them into an overcalculated delivery. But try the third movement at 2'58" where, having fined the texture down to a whisper, Janácek gives the first violin an electrifying outburst: it's hard to imagine if that contrast has been made more emotionally real on record.
But then there is the 1925 Second Quartet by the composer whose name the players have adopted. This is the kind of piece that may make you wonder why you haven't heard it before.
After a first movement that tellingly redeploys a number of patent Janácekisms, Haas slips into the grotesque humour of Stravinsky's ThreePieces for String Quartet and once again fashions a structure that transcends reliance on its model.
In the finale whackiness goes a step further, with a rollicking jazz-folk fusion, brilliantly caught here together with the original drum-kit accompaniment that Haas suppressed following adverse criticism at the premiere. The PHQ's streamlined but full-blooded playing is more than welcome, and if they are lining up the first Janácek and the first and third Haas for a followup CD, bravo! Superb recording quality too.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“Yet these young players stamp their authority on the piece with a technical precision and a searing immediacy that’s rarely if ever been equalled...You’d be disappointed if the quartet that named itself after the composer couldn’t make it a special recording, and it has. Great performances, an imaginative programme, and a superb recording as well. This couldn’t be better.” Andrew McGregor, bbc.co.uk, 18th December 2006

“…try the third movement at 2'58" where, having fined the texture down to a whisper, Janáček gives the first violin an electrifying outburst; if that contrast has been made more emotionally real on record it is certainly not so on the half-dozen LPs and CDs I picked off my shelves. I would almost be inclined to recommend the new disc for this moment alone. But there is the 1925 Second Quartet by the composer whose name the players have adopted. After a first movement that tellingly redeploys a number of patent Janáčekisms, Haas slips into the grotesque humour of Stravinsky's Three Pieces for String Quartet and once again fashions a structure that transcends reliance on its model. In the finale whackiness goes a step further, with a rollicking jazz-folk fusion... the PHQ's streamlined but full-blooded playing more than welcome...” Gramophone Magazine, November 2006