Late String Quartets Op.130 & 133

Brentano String Quartet

The Brentano Quartet delivers the third volume of Beethoven’s Late Quartets for æon, this disc featuring Opp. 130 and 133. The relation between form and language seems to haunt all the writing of his Quartet in B flat major. Indeed, the composer struggles with the enigmatic question of our intimate experience in relation to music and the sense of musical composition. On the other hand, in the Grosse Fuge, Op. 133, Beethoven the visionary proclaims his unshakeable faith in a world like a will facing menace and chaos.The pertinence of the struggle marks the structure and character of every page of the quartet, one of the composer’s most inspired. Impossible not to be impressed by the sharpness of the stroke, the clarity of the discourse and the intensity of the affects. Brilliant virtuosos, the superb mastery of the Brentanos has made them famous and displays its full power in the release of this final volume.

Beethoven:
 Grosse Fuge in B flat major, Op. 133
 String Quartet No. 13 in B flat major, Op. 130

"The expressive badinage between players, the enthusiastic rough and tumble in the opening Allegro with just a smidgen of tonal darkening for the second subject, not to mention the occasional hint of a portamento, place this performance securely in the realms of an inherited European tradition...a strong, communicative interpretation."
Gramophone Magazine - December 2014