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Gramophone Classical Music Guide 2010 Janácek changed his mind a great deal, especially about the Second Quartet, on the way from composition to performance and even after that. Most records use the scores published in Prague respectively in 1945 and 1949 as ‘revised editions’. However, Milan Skampa published further revisions in 1975 and 1979, and these are what are used here by the quartet which studied under him at the time of its formation in 1989. The differences depend mostly upon dynamic markings and emphases. To these the present players give great attention, stressing the sudden changes of tempo or dynamics and the consequent abrupt changes of mood which mark the music. They also pay particular attention to coloration of tone. In the First Quartet, for instance, where the seducer of the Tolstoy-inspired ‘plot’ makes his mincing entrance, the sound is deceptively warm within the delicacy; other quartets play the theme with almost disdainful thinness, but the Skampa allow him his dangerous charm. In the final movement of the Second Quartet, there’s a searing discord marked to be played fortississimo but right up near the bridge where string tone is weakest: the outcome is a horrible sound, and the Skampa believe that that’s what’s meant. In short, these are sharp, well-considered performances, vivid in detail and excellently judged in structure. They take their place in the catalogue beside the marvellous Talich Quartet (reviewed above) and the Pavel Haas Quartet’s discs. |
