Album

Panocha Quartet

Martinů: String Quartets (Complete)

Catalogue Number: SU 3917-2
Published: 18th May 2007
Genre: Chamber Music
Format: 3 CD
This complete collection of Bohuslav Martinů's string quartets was recorded in the years 1979-1983, at the peak of the Panocha Quartet's career. Martinů's quartets were written over the entire span of his life, and each of them is a world unto itself. The Impressionistic "French" Quartet, and the Quartet No. 4 (Paris, 1937) were written in the period between theWorld Wars. Martinů's unique compositional identity appears for the first time, however, in the Quartet No. 2 (1925). The Quartet No. 5 and Janáček's Intimate Letters have much in common, including their romantic dimension and their passion born of an inner pressure. After the Quartet No. 6 (1946), which in a way parallels Dvořák's work during his soujourn in America, Martinů brings his quartet work to a climax with his seventh piece, the Concerto da camera, a miniature full of inner contentment, as if the composer had found time for inner contemplation andmeditation in this favorite chamber composition.

CD 1

Bohuslav Martinů
String Quartet No. 1, H. 117
1. Moderato. Allegro ma non troppo 08:32
2. Andante moderato 06:13
3. Allegro non troppo 09:13
4. Allegro con brio 12:11
Bohuslav Martinů
String Quartet No. 2, H. 150
5. Moderato. Allegro vivace 07:14
6. Andante 06:03
7. Allegro con brio 06:19

CD 2

Bohuslav Martinů
String Quartet No. 3, H. 183
1. Allegro 04:01
2. Andante 04:43
3. Vivo 03:23
Bohuslav Martinů
String Quartet No. 4, H. 256
4. Allegro poco moderato 06:06
5. Allegro scherzando 03:53
6. Adagio 05:32
7. Allegro 04:30
Bohuslav Martinů
String Quartet No. 5, H. 268
8. Allegro ma non troppo 06:21
9. Adagio 06:51
10. Allegro vivo 05:35
11. Lento - Allegro - Moderato 08:23

CD 3

Bohuslav Martinů
String Quartet No. 6, H. 312
1. Allegro moderato 06:59
2. Andante 07:30
3. Allegro con brio 08:18
Bohuslav Martinů
String Quartet No. 7 (Concerto da camera), H. 314
4. Poco allegro 07:23
5. Andante 08:31
6. Allegro vivo 06:03