Document

  1994
    October 1994
        Chamber
                Grieg String Quartets. Johansen String Quartet, Op. 35.

Grieg String [Quartet] Quartets—No. 1 in G minor, Op. 27; No. 2 in F, CW146.

Johansen String Quartet, Op. 35. Oslo Quartet (Geir Inge Lotsberg, Per Kristian Skalstad, vns; Are Sandbakken, va; Oystein Sonstad, vc).

Naxos (Super budget price) (CD) 8 550879 (72 minutes: DDD). Recorded in association with the Union Bank of Norway.

Grieg turned three times to the string quartet, but his first attempt of 1861 has been lost. The G minor Quartet of 1878 was followed by the F major of 1891—a work, however, which remained incomplete. These performances are by a recently formed Norwegian ensemble and they present the two extant works powerfully. The recording is also powerful, and indeed too glaring for complete comfort: reducing the volume does not take the edge off this string tone. Nevertheless, there is much to enjoy here, and the young players of the Oslo Quartet respond fully to the vivid impulse of the G minor Quartet, not least its big, thrusting first movement, and a few rough edges in the playing remain acceptable. One is reminded, though, that Grieg's publisher has not remained alone in thinking the work too orchestral in texture: one does not experience the intimacy of chamber music as Haydn or even Beethoven understood it, although the composer's natural lyricism emerges attractively in the Romanze slow movement. For my taste, these artists are sometimes too forceful here, but the ending is sensitively shaped and the following Intermezzo and finale come over strongly. The F major Quartet is gentler in character, and the four artists impart a pleasing flow to the two extant movements, the second of which is a scherzo whose D minor quirkiness suggests some trollish picture.

Grieg's compatriot David Monrad Johansen (1888-1974) is represented in the catalogue by three pieces, though not this String Quartet of 1969, his last work. He was hardly prolific, for it was only his Op. 35. Stark, yet essentially conservative in language, it is worth a hearing although the Largo strikes me as very glumly Nordic. However, the Oslo Quartet present it persuasively.

CH



		Grieg turned three times to the string quartet, but his first attempt of 1861 has been lost. The G minor Quartet of 1878 was followed by the F major of 1891—a work, however, which remained incomplete. These performances are by a recently formed Norwegian ensemble and they present the two extant works powerfully. The recording is also powerful, and indeed too glaring for complete comfort: reducing the volume does not take the edge off this string tone. Nevertheless, there is much to enjoy here, and the young players of the Oslo Quartet respond fully to the vivid impulse of the G minor Quartet, not least its big, thrusting first movement, and a few rough edges in the playing remain acceptable. One is reminded, though, that Grieg's publisher has not remained alone in thinking the work too orchestral in texture: one does not experience the intimacy of chamber music as Haydn or even Beethoven understood it, although the composer's natural lyricism emerges attractively in the Romanze slow movement. For my taste, these artists are sometimes too forceful here, but the ending is sensitively shaped and the following Intermezzo and finale come over strongly. The F major Quartet is gentler in character, and the four artists impart a pleasing flow to the two extant movements, the second of which is a scherzo whose D minor quirkiness suggests some trollish picture.



		Grieg's compatriot David Monrad Johansen (1888-1974) is represented in the catalogue by three pieces, though not this String Quartet of 1969, his last work. He was hardly prolific, for it was only his Op. 35. Stark, yet essentially conservative in language, it is worth a hearing although the Largo strikes me as very glumly Nordic. However, the Oslo Quartet present it persuasively.