Schubert: String Quartets D. 112 & 887 Takács Quartet

• Franz Schubert (1797 - 1828): String Quartet No. 15 in G Major, D. 887:
• 1 Schubert: String Quartet No. 15 in G Major, D. 887: I. Allegro molto moderato 21:16
• 2 Schubert: String Quartet No. 15 in G Major, D. 887: II. Andante un poco moto 11:20
• 3 Schubert: String Quartet No. 15 in G Major, D. 887: III. Scherzo. Allegro vivace – Trio. Allegretto 07:03
• 4 Schubert: String Quartet No. 15 in G Major, D. 887: IV. Allegro assai 10:45
• String Quartet No. 8 in B-Flat Major, D. 112:
• 5 Schubert: String Quartet No. 8 in B-Flat Major, D. 112: I. Allegro ma non troppo 09:31
• 6 Schubert: String Quartet No. 8 in B-Flat Major, D. 112: II. Andante sostenuto 08:36
• 7 Schubert: String Quartet No. 8 in B-Flat Major, D. 112: III. Menuetto. Allegro 05:14
• 8 Schubert: String Quartet No. 8 in B-Flat Major, D. 112: IV. Presto 04:01
• Total Runtime 01:17:46

Info for Schubert: String Quartets D. 112 & 887

The "heavenly lengths" Schumann loved in late Schubert are as much in evidence in the sublime G major quartet as in the other large-scale works of Schubert’s final years. The Takács Quartet’s earlier Hyperion recordings of Schubert were hailed as ‘near ideal’ and ‘superlative’ and this new release is every bit as fine.

Goethe’s famous characterization of the string quartet as ‘a conversation between four intelligent people’ neatly encapsulates an essential aspect of the medium around the turn of the nineteenth century, the time of Haydn’s last and Beethoven’s first quartets. The perfection of the quartet by Haydn and, later, Mozart as a subtle, civilized, often witty discourse between four nominally equal players was one of the supreme achievements of the Age of Enlightenment. By 1810, when the thirteen-year-old Schubert penned his first string quartet (the quartet in mixed keys, D18), the masterpieces of Haydn and Mozart, together with Beethoven’s Op 18 quartets, had been enshrined as a Classical canon, at once an inspiration and a challenge to any right-thinking young Viennese composer.

Undaunted, Schubert followed his first essay in the medium with a dozen more quartets, two of them lost, by the time of his twentieth birthday. With no immediate prospect of publication, Schubert intended them either for fellow students at the Viennese City Seminary (Stadtkonvikt), where he studied until the summer of 1813, or for his family quartet, in which he played the viola, with his brothers Ferdinand and Ignaz on violin and his father on cello.

By early September 1814, when he composed his String Quartet in B flat major, D112, the teenaged Schubert had begun to lead something of a double life as a reluctant—and none too effective—teacher at his father’s primary school, and as a composer of ferocious productivity. Amid his classroom duties he penned the quartet between 5 and 13 September, dating all four movements and adding at the end of the first movement ‘In 4 1/2 Stunden verfertigt’ (‘completed in 4 1/2 hours’)—though we can guess that, like his idol Mozart, Schubert did much of the essential planning in his head. ...

Takács Quartet

Takács Quartet
The world-renowned Takács Quartet is now entering its forty-ninth season. Edward Dusinberre, Harumi Rhodes (violins), Richard O’Neill (viola) and András Fejér (cello) are excited about the 2023-2024 season that features varied projects including a new work written for them. Nokuthula Ngwenyama composed ‘Flow,’ an exploration and celebration of the natural world. The work was commissioned by nine concert presenters throughout the USA. July sees the release of a new recording of works by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor and Dvořák for Hyperion Records, while later in the season the quartet will release works by Schubert including his final quartet in G major. In the Spring of 2024 the ensemble will perform and record piano quintets by Price and Dvořák with long-time chamber music partner Marc-Andre Hamelin.

As Associate Artists at London’s Wigmore Hall the Takács will perform four concerts featuring works by Hough, Price, Janacek, Schubert and Beethoven. During the season the ensemble will play at other prestigious European venues including Berlin, Geneva, Linz, Innsbruck, Cambridge and St. Andrews. The Takács will appear at the Adams Chamber Music Festival in New Zealand. The group’s North American engagements include concerts in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington DC, Vancouver, Ann Arbor, Phoenix, Berkeley, Los Angeles, Portland, Cleveland, Santa Fe and Stanford. The ensemble will perform two Bartók cycles at San Jose State University and Middlebury College and appear for the first time at the Virginia Arts Festival with pianist Olga Kern.

The members of the Takács Quartet are Christoffersen Fellows and Artists in Residence at the University of Colorado, Boulder. For the 23-24 season the quartet enter into a partnership with El Sistema Colorado, working closely with its chamber music education program in Denver. During the summer months the Takács join the faculty at the Music Academy of the West, running an intensive quartet seminar.

In 2021 the Takács won a Presto Music Recording of the Year Award for their recordings of string quartets by Fanny and Felix Mendelssohn, and a Gramophone Award with pianist Garrick Ohlsson for piano quintets by Amy Beach and Elgar. Other releases for Hyperion feature works by Haydn, Schubert, Janáček, Smetana, Debussy and Britten, as well as piano quintets by César Franck and Shostakovich (with Marc-André Hamelin), and viola quintets by Brahms and Dvorák (with Lawrence Power). For their CDs on the Decca/London label, the Quartet has won three Gramophone Awards, a Grammy Award, three Japanese Record Academy Awards, Disc of the Year at the inaugural BBC Music Magazine Awards, and Ensemble Album of the Year at the Classical Brits. Full details of all recordings can be found in the Recordings section of the Quartet's website.

The Takács Quartet is known for its innovative programming. In 2021-22 the ensemble partnered with bandoneon virtuoso Julien Labro to premiere new works by Clarice Assad and Bryce Dessner, commissioned by Music Accord. In 2014 the Takács performed a program inspired by Philip Roth’s novel Everyman with Meryl Streep at Princeton, and again with her at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto in 2015. They first performed Everyman at Carnegie Hall in 2007 with Philip Seymour Hoffman. They have toured 14 cities with the poet Robert Pinsky, and played regularly with the Hungarian Folk group Muzsikas.

In 2014 the Takács became the first string quartet to be awarded the Wigmore Hall Medal. In 2012, Gramophone announced that the Takács was the first string quartet to be inducted into its Hall of Fame. The ensemble also won the 2011 Award for Chamber Music and Song presented by the Royal Philharmonic Society in London.

The Takács Quartet was formed in 1975 at the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest by Gabor Takács-Nagy, Károly Schranz, Gabor Ormai and András Fejér, while all four were students. The group received international attention in 1977, winning First Prize and the Critics’ Prize at the International String Quartet Competition in Evian, France. The Quartet also won the Gold Medal at the 1978 Portsmouth and Bordeaux Competitions and First Prizes at the Budapest International String Quartet Competition in 1978 and the Bratislava Competition in 1981. The Quartet made its North American debut tour in 1982. Members of the Takács Quartet are the grateful beneficiaries of an instrument loan by the Drake Foundation.

Booklet for Schubert: String Quartets D. 112 & 887