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Favorite Classical String Quartets

When I started listening to Classical Music as a teenager over 50 years ago I quickly became seduced by the sounds of a string quartet.  My school library had a Seraphim 3LP set of Beethoven Middle Period Quartets with the Hungarian SQ (this was in stereo; they had recorded them in mono as well).  Op. 59/1, the first of the Razumovsky Quartets, was my seductress:  those long soulful cello lines, with the viola weaving in and out, the violins then sweetly taking over the main themes, and then all the instruments trading places-I was hooked.

 59/3 has a second movement dominated by the cellist who sounds like a jazz walking bass, and that furious fugal finale.  The Harp Quartet in that with its flying pizzicatos was another revelation.

  Beethoven’s late quartets are another thing entirely, and took a few generations for nineteenth century listeners to absorb.  Mozart and Haydn invented the genre and a lot of their best music is in their quartets.

  The aforementioned Classical Period composers are generally thought to have represented the apex of the genre, but I have always been fascinated by Dvorak, Borodin, and Shostakovich, all of whom seemed to luxuriate in the special sonic world of the string quartet.

 

 Other favorites?

  T

mahler123
billsw
32 posts
 

Quartetto Italiano for the Beethoven middle and late quartets

Also great for the late Schubert quartets.

Borodin String Quartet for the Shostakovich quartets. You probably want the second set from the 1980s.

larryi
4,629 posts
 

The Beethoven Razumovski and late quartets are among my favorites.  I also like Haydn and Schubert quartets as well as other Schubert chamber works, particularly his String Quintet (D. 956) and his Piano Quintet.  There are many other composers whose chamber works are, to me, indispensable, like Shostakovich’s string quartets and his incredible piano trio no. 2.  I am also a big fan of the quartets of several British composers like Britten, Vaughn Williams, Tippett, and Alwyn.  A BIG surprise, given how unknown they remain, are the quartets of Villa Lobos.  I will save for later some recommendations for more modern compositions.

mahler123 OP
4,100 posts
 

@bruce19 

 

of course I listen to all genresharmo of chamber music, trios, duos, quintets, whatever.  However all chamber music in one thread I thought to be excessively ambitious

  I love the Haydn Quartets, as they are brimming with invention and humor.  However I like the way that composers that followed in his wake expanded sonority and particularly gave the cello and viola more to do harmonically 

mahler123 OP
4,100 posts
 

@billstevenson 

 

i don’t want to criticize your purchasing habits, but based on a few posts here it sounds like you are concentrating on being a completist collector, and perhaps not always appreciating what you have collected.  I appreciate that you find anything after the early classical period challenging.  However you claim to have a great deal of Dvorak.  Just do yourself a favor and give a listen to his American Quartet.  If you find that music hard, challenging, whatever then I guess we are so far apart aesthetically as to lack a basis for real dialogue.  I’m not being judgmental, just hoping that you will have an open mind and appreciate something beautiful.

mahler123 OP
4,100 posts
 

@billsw 

 

I have the original Borodin Shostakovich set, which was first in the States on Melodyia (I have it on Chandos).  This set was set down before the composer had died so it doesn’t contain 14/15.  I also have most of the 1980s set.

  However the set that I truly love is the Fitzwilliam Quartet.

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