Beethoven Schmann

The Doric String Quartet is firmly established as one of the leading quartets of its generation, receiving enthusiastic responses from audiences and critics around the globe. Celebrating their 25th anniversary, the Quartet here embarks on a significant new recording project – the complete string quartets by Beethoven. This first volume combines works from Beethoven’s early, middle, and late period.

Within the space of a mere couple of CDs, it is possible to encapsulate works which are not only among the most beautiful ever written for the cello and piano duo, but also represent the very birth of the genre we call the sonata for cello and piano in the classic meaning of the term. Beethoven’s output for the two instruments comprises some absolute masterpieces and other works which maybe cannot claim the same status, but still are among the favourites of performers and audiences alike.

Two symphonies from Beethoven's so-called 'Heroic' period—No 4 completed in 1806 and the supremely defiant No 5 begun in the same year and completed two years later.

Cellist Yegor Dyachkov and pianist Jean Saulnier present Beethoven’s complete Sonatas and Variations for Cello and Piano in digital and physical formats. Comprising works from the composer’s Op. 5, Op. 17, Op. 66, and Op. 102, the complete sonatas will be released as a three-CD box set on October 28, 2022. Spanning the composer’s three creative periods, Beethoven’s sonatas for cello and piano constitute a unique group within his oeuvre. “Recording the complete sonatas marks a milestone in an artistic career,” says cellist Yegor Dyachkov. “Most artists undertake such a project only once, and only after having spent a long time in the company of these works, so that the various possible interpretive paths reach a kind of equilibrium.”