PAVEL HAAS QUARTET

One of the most distinctive ensembles on the world chamber music scene, the Pavel Haas Quartet, returns after three years with a new album, this time dedicated to the string quartets of Bohuslav Martinů. The recording features Quartets Nos. 2, 3, 5, and 7 – four separate musical worlds that engage in a quiet but intense dialogue spanning more than two decades of the 20th century. The album will be released by Supraphon on 19 September 2025 on CD and in digital formats.

The ensemble, renowned for its rich and colorful sound, precise ensemble playing, and deep understanding of musical detail, has long been devoted to Bohuslav Martinů’s quartet works with extraordinary sensitivity. The new album follows on from their successful concert performances of the complete quartet cycle at venues such as London’s Wigmore Hall.

“Our goal was not to present the quartets chronologically, but as four distinct worlds that resonate with each other. Each of them was written in a different period of the composer’s life and carries a different mood, a different way of musical thinking – but the same Bohuslav is always present in them,” say the members of the ensemble.

The second quartet is imbued with youthful energy and marked Martinů’s breakthrough into international consciousness. The third quartet is experimental and exceptional in its linguistic daring. The fifth quartet, written in Paris in 1938, is emotionally charged and deeply personal – the composer dedicated it to his muse Vítězslava Kaprálová. The seventh quartet, written nine years later in New York, is a return to a calmer, more lyrical style and is dedicated to Martinů’s wife Charlotte.

The Pavel Haas Quartet’s performance of Bohuslav Martinů’s music is not only brilliantly interpreted, but above all deeply felt. The album offers listeners the opportunity to enter the intimate world of one of the greatest Czech composers of the 20th century – a world where four voices become a single organism that breathes, pulsates, and tells a story.