MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2024
60,000 reviews
... and still writing ...

Search MusicWeb Here Acte Prealable Polish CDs
 

Presto Music CD retailer
 
Founder: Len Mullenger                                    Editor in Chief:John Quinn             


 REVIEW

Some items
to consider

new MWI
Current reviews

old MWI
pre-2023 reviews

paid for
advertisements

Acte Prealable Polish recordings

Forgotten Recordings
Forgotten Recordings
All Forgotten Records Reviews

TROUBADISC
Troubadisc Weinberg- TROCD01450

All Troubadisc reviews


FOGHORN Classics

Alexandra-Quartet
Brahms String Quartets

All Foghorn Reviews


All HDTT reviews


Songs to Harp from
the Old and New World


all Nimbus reviews



all tudor reviews


Follow us on Twitter


Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Editor in Chief
John Quinn
Contributing Editor
Ralph Moore
Webmaster
   David Barker
Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf
MusicWeb Founder
   Len Mullenger

alternatively
CD: AmazonUK AmazonUS
Download: Classicsonline


Antonín DVOŘÁK (1841-1904)
String Quartets - Volume 8
String Quartet No. 3 in D, B18 (1869/70) [63:43]
Vlach Quartet Prague (Jana Vlachová, Karel Stadthere (violins); Petr Vemer (viola); Mikael Ericsson (cello)).
rec. Studio Martinek, Prague, Czech Republic, 6-7 April, 18 June 1998, 27-28 January 1999. DDD
NAXOS 8.553378 [63:43]
Experience Classicsonline

The Vlach Quartet Prague should not be confused with the original Vlach Quartet - see, for example, the latter’s coupling of Dvořák Thirteenth Quartet and Tchaikovsky Third here. While reviewing the previous volume of this series, I gave a potted history of the present Vlach Quartet’s history. 

The same comment about recording quality pretty much applies - “not over-warm but detail is exemplary”, except that on the present occasion the edge and lack of depth as well as tone seemed more distracting, especially in the third movement - producer and engineer was Václav Zamazal). 

Dvořák’s Third Quartet is hardly concise. It lasts over an hour; the first movement alone is nearly 24 minutes, and the rest of the four movements are all not too far off a quarter of an hour each. The composer had clearly not yet learned the art of tasteful pruning. Neither had he shorn himself of the influence of Liszt and Wagner - parts of the first movement pine for Siegfried Idyll.

The infinite length of the first movement invites a different course of listening, one that quite simply goes with the flow in what can seem like an eighteenth-century Czech stream of consciousness. It is important to jettison expectations of duration, and once that is achieved much enjoyment is there for the taking. The Andantino, too, as an easy fluency about it, along with a distinct conversational element that exists between the four protagonists.

The third movement quotes “Hej, Slované”, a patriotic song popular during the development of the Czech national movement. It is here that the lack of depth of field to the recording is felt the most, however - the finale seems less afflicted somehow. The finale is perhaps the most meandering movement. It is, though, the one with the most obvious Dvořákian fingerprints - there are moments when the composer almost seems to be putting his characteristic gestures in quotation marks, they stand out so much. It is as if he suddenly finds his voice for a moment, then turns down the focus after a short period to return to the earlier modes of expression.

None of the four movements are written in the white heat of inspiration. That, plus the fact that the present release was recorded in four instalments over nine months - one studio session per movement - means that this can only be an interim recommendation, even in a limited field. If you follow the advice given at the beginning of the review as a listening strategy, though, many delights await, plus there is the opportunity to trace the development of one of the great composers’ voices from a cheap price-point. Supraphon has paved the way in issuing Dvořák’s operas, in particular, plus many glorious other recordings. If the current issue whets your appetite, the Brilliant Classics box of the complete Dvořák quartets played by the Stamitz Quartet (Brilliant 99949) is well worth investigating; again, it is buried in an eight-CD set with the eminently recommendable Panocha Quartet this time, on Supraphon (SU38152), at a similar price-point.

Colin Clarke 

 


Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos reviews

Chandos recordings
All Chandos reviews

Hyperion recordings
All Hyperion reviews

Foghorn recordings
All Foghorn reviews

Troubadisc recordings
All Troubadisc reviews



all Bridge reviews


all cpo reviews

Divine Art recordings
Click to see New Releases
Get 10% off using code musicweb10
All Divine Art reviews


All Eloquence reviews

Lyrita recordings
All Lyrita Reviews

 

Wyastone New Releases
Obtain 10% discount

Subscribe to our free weekly review listing

 

 


EXPLORE MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL

Making a Donation to MusicWeb

Writing CD reviews for MWI

About MWI
Who we are, where we have come from and how we do it.

Site Map

How to find a review

How to find articles on MusicWeb
Listed in date order

Review Indexes
   By Label
      Select a label and all reviews are listed in Catalogue order
   By Masterwork
            Links from composer names (eg Sibelius) are to resource pages with links to the review indexes for the individual works as well as other resources.

Themed Review pages

Jazz reviews

 

Discographies
   Composer
      Composer surveys
   National
      Unique to MusicWeb -
a comprehensive listing of all LP and CD recordings of given works
.
Prepared by Michael Herman

The Collector’s Guide to Gramophone Company Record Labels 1898 - 1925
Howard Friedman

Book Reviews

Complete Books
We have a number of out of print complete books on-line

Interviews
With Composers, Conductors, Singers, Instumentalists and others
Includes those on the Seen and Heard site

Nostalgia

Nostalgia CD reviews

Records Of The Year
Each reviewer is given the opportunity to select the best of the releases

Monthly Best Buys
Recordings of the Month and Bargains of the Month

Comment
Arthur Butterworth Writes

An occasional column

Phil Scowcroft's Garlands
British Light Music articles

Classical blogs
A listing of Classical Music Blogs external to MusicWeb International

Reviewers Logs
What they have been listening to for pleasure

Announcements

 

Community
Bulletin Board

Give your opinions or seek answers

Reviewers
Past and present

Helpers invited!

Resources
How Did I Miss That?

Currently suspended but there are a lot there with sound clips


Composer Resources

British Composers

British Light Music Composers

Other composers

Film Music (Archive)
Film Music on the Web (Closed in December 2006)

Programme Notes
For concert organizers

External sites
British Music Society
The BBC Proms
Orchestra Sites
Recording Companies & Retailers
Online Music
Agents & Marketing
Publishers
Other links
Newsgroups
Web News sites etc

PotPourri
A pot-pourri of articles

MW Listening Room
MW Office

Advice to Windows Vista users  
Questionnaire    
Site History  
What they say about us
What we say about us!
Where to get help on the Internet
CD orders By Special Request
Graphics archive
Currency Converter
Dictionary
Magazines
Newsfeed  
Web Ring
Translation Service

Rules for potential reviewers :-)
Do Not Go Here!
April Fools




Return to Review Index