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See Terms & Conditions for p&p rates. | |  | Rubbra - String Quartets Nos. 1-4
Edmund Rubbra’s String Quartets span his career from 1933 to 1977. Possibly the Second is the best known, but as a group they make an unmissable pendant to the symphonies. Possibly the most important string quartet cycle by any British composer, the Dutton Epoch recordings by the Dante Quartet enjoyed a very positive critical reception when they first appeared, and have now been re-packaged as a bargain-priced 2-CD box set. “The Dante's rendition of Rubbra's four quartets is superb, but the gem here is Pierre Doumenge and Michael Dussek's account of the Cello Sonata.” BBC Music Magazine, September 2010 ***** | | | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. |
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| |  | Rubbra: String Quartets Volume 1
The English composer Edmund Rubbra described the string quartet as ‘the purest and most lucid texture available to a composer’, his essays in the form enlivened by Beethovenian vigour and song-like beauty. It is a testament to his profound compositional craftsmanship that even when deploying diverse rhythms simultaneously or releasing the latent potential of what he called the ‘most positive yet mysterious intervals’, Rubbra weaves fascinating musical textures into a satisfying whole. His Piano Trio No. 1 foregoes mere virtuosity for spiritual intensity, while several songs show his sensitivity in setting Medieval and Renaissance texts. “…a fine portrait of a composer with a calmly insistent mind of his own. The most individual statements are the two groups of songs for voice and string quartet… Charles Daniels sings these with equable composure, and immaculate sensitivity to Rubbra's word-setting; meanwhile the Maggini Quartet's accompaniments evoke the sound of a viol consort without overdoing it...” BBC Music Magazine, January 2010 *** “[the Second Quartet] is a bracingly cogent utterance...The Maggini players do it proud, their treatment of the sublime cavatina slow movement affording especial pleasure. No complaints, either, with Charles Daniels's intelligent and stylish collaboration with the Magginis” Gramophone Magazine, June 2010 | | | (also available to download from $6.00) | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. (Available now to download.) |
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Michael Dussek (piano) Dante Quartet: Krysia Osostowicz & Declan Daley (violins), Judith Busbridge (viola), Alastair Blayden (cello) “Completed in 1951, the Second Quartet is a marvellously inventive piece, beautifully scored for the medium, unfailingly purposeful and full of beguilingly subtle rhythmic and harmonic resource. Bearing a dedication to Robert Simpson, the two-movement Fourth Quartet of 1975-7 was one of Rubbra's last major works.
Probing and intensely poignant, it's another hugely eloquent, seamlessly evolving affair which repays repeated hearings. The Dante Quartet prove outstandingly sympathetic proponents of Rubbra's noble inspiration, their playing urgently expressive and tonally ingratiating.
Pianist Michael Dussek joins proceedings for a stylish and delectably unforced account of the Lyric Movement of 1929, an expertly wrought essay for piano quintet which itself grew out of an earlier, discarded string quartet. Tony Faulkner's Maltings sound is excellent on the whole, if just a fraction too closely balanced. No matter, a wonderful disc.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010 | | | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. |
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