Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel (1805-1847)
String Quartet in E flat major (1834)
Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (1809-1847)
String Quartet No. 5 in E flat major, Op.44 No. 3 (1838)
Minguet Quartet
rec. 2018, Ev. Kirche, Honrath, Germany
cpo 555 261-2 [55]
For some reason we’ve missed out on reviewing some of the Minguet Quartet’s recordings of Mendelssohn’s complete string quartets, of which this is the fourth and final volume. These CDs are available individually but have now also been boxed together on cpo 555 795-2, and volume two was admired by Gavin Dixon back in 2012 (review).
The programme begins with Felix’s elder sister Fanny’s only work in this genre, the String Quartet in E flat major. Music was only ever allowed “to be an adornment, never the foundation of life,” for Fanny, as declared by their father Abraham, and with the conventions of the time it was never going to be a career option. Her husband the sculptor Wilhelm Hensel supported her work however, and she was to become known for her “Sunday Musicales” and an established figure in Berlin’s artistic circles. Her String Quartet is an excellent piece, full of contrasts, harmonic surprise and a dynamism that takes it way beyond being a mere salon entertainment.
Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel’s String Quartet has been recorded before, and fairly recently by the Chaos Quartet on the Solo Musica label (review). The Minguet Quartet’s performance is meaty and impressive where the Chaos Quartet is a little closer in their recorded perspective, providing a more confiding impression while still turning in a fine performance. I prefer the more orchestral profile offered by the Minguet Quartet. Their performance is full of conviction and delivers something that very much stands on its own terms, creating something more emphatic and rounded than a work that “obstinately falls short of memorability” as summed up by Philip Borg-Wheeler.
Felix Mendelssohn completed his Opus 44 No. 3 four years after his sister’s work, considering it “several hundred times better” than his previous quartets. There are numerous technical reasons for this, and these are outlined in Dr. Matthias Carvin’s booklet notes, the précis of which being that Mendelssohn manages to achieve a level of motivic connection and cohesion that ticks all of the boxes of “musical quality and sophistication” that we seek in the best classical string quartets. The dramatic qualities in this piece are on a level with Schubert, and it is clear that both he and his sister were very much in thrall to Beethoven and his late quartets.
Felix Mendelssohn’s string quartets have of course been recorded many times and there is a comparative selection from back in 2005 to be found on the old MWI site here. The Minguet Quartet distinguishes itself in its drive and energy in this music, emphasising contrasts that manage to keep in character with the composer’s idiom while impressing us anew with his brilliance as a composer. Almost at random I picked out the Emerson Quartet’s complete set on Deutsche Grammophon (review), and as with the comparison for Fanny’s quartet was struck by the greater ‘chamber music’ effect in this recording when compared to this cpo disc. The Emerson Quartet is of course excellent and their collection highly desirable, but the impression left on me as a listener is more ‘String Quartet’, where that of the Minguet Quartet’s is ‘Mendelssohn’. This is quartet playing with the kind of cohesion that allows you to forget that there are only four players involved and, listening to the other discs, I would be inclined to recommend their complete edition to anyone looking to rediscover Mendelssohn’s string quartets as a body of work with more impressive qualities than previous expectations might have allowed.
Dominy Clements
Performers
Ulrich Isfort (1st violin), Annette Reisinger (2nd violin), Aida-Carmen Soanea (viola), Matthias Diener (cello)
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