Shostakovich String Quartet No. 10

It tends to be Russian performers who capture the dark, emotional undercurrents of Shostakovich's music, but few chamber groups have ever done it as well as the Belcea Quartet, a London-based group of central and eastern European players. Neither the Piano Quintet in G minor, Op. 57, nor the String Quartet No. 3 in F major, Op. 73, is a commonly played work, but taken together, in the Belcea's more-than-capable hands, they have a powerful impact.

Piotr Anderszewski and the Belcea Quartet make superb partners in one of Shostakovich’s most performed chamber works. They present the powerful and highly approachable Piano Quintet with playing of colossal tensile strength, a tightly focused sound and yet with a willingness to respond to the work’s undeniable lyricism. The work’s rigour is striking when performed with this kind of intensity and concentration. The Third Quartet (1946) remains one of Shostakovich’s finest—and one of his favourites, perhaps because it responds so powerfully to the combustible events of the time. The Belceas capture its sardonic, sometimes violent, mood to perfection.

Finally, a Shostakovich CD by the Asasello-Quartett! The internationally successful and award-winning ensemble has long been intensively engaged with the 15 works of the great Russian composer and is now embarking on a complete recording. The new GENUIN release of Dmitri Shostakovich’s Quartets Nos. 7 - 13 now kicks off the series. According to the booklet for the production, “Love, death and dearest people – these are the themes of the works heard on this double CD.” And the Asasello-Quartett spans the breadth of interpretation just as broadly as the variety of themes outlined here: with poignancy, elegance, and virtuosity – a whole world of its own!

There’s a great quote in Wendy Lesser’s excellent book, Music for Silenced Voices: Shostakovich and his Fifteen Quartets, that describes the composer’s unique relationship with his quartets: “He could toy with cacophony, immerse himself in irony, indulge in all his darkest, least acceptable moods, and not be called unpatriotic, because nobody who cared about such labels [the Soviet censors] was listening to these compositions.” That’s why these works are so great: they represent the unbridled creative powers of one of the twentieth century’s great composers. This is the third of four releases ……

Robert Moon @ Audiophile Audition