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             


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

REVIEW


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

 

 

 

alternatively
CD: MDT AmazonUK AmazonUS

Richard STRAUSS (1864-1949)
Capriccio Op 85, Prelude for string sextet* (1941) [10:47]
Anton BRUCKNER (1824-1896)
String Quintet in F major (1879) [41:55]
Intermezzo in D minor for string quintet (1879) [3:56]
The Raphael Ensemble (Anthony Marwood (violin); Elizabeth Wexler (violin); Timothy Boulton (viola); James Boyd (viola); Andrea Hess (cello); Michael Stirling (cello)*)
rec. 24-26 October 1993, St George’s, Brandon Hill, Bristol.
HYPERION HELIOS CDH55372 [57:37]

Experience Classicsonline



Finished in 1879, the Quintet is thus a mature work by a composer who had already written - and in the case of the Fourth and Fifth, revised - five symphonies. There is a always a richness of sonority and harmony in this music which has given rise to the cliché that Bruckner’s idiom is too dense and orchestral, an accusation hardly borne out by the delicacy of some passages. The first subject is a melancholy, bittersweet melody which cascades down the scale before yielding to a more restless figure which is passed from instrument to instrument. The Scherzo is an odd hobgoblin dance played with great flexibility and charm here. It was initially scorned by Joseph Hellmesberger, the begetter of the quintet, as too difficult and abstruse, so Buckner accommodated him by writing an Intermezzo - here appended as a bonus - as a simpler, shorter alternative but retaining the same Trio that we hear in the Scherzo. However, the original Scherzo was soon re-admitted and in 1885 even Hellmesberger’s ensemble was playing it in preference to the Intermezzo. Listening to the sublime serenity of the Adagio, it is hard to believe that Bruckner was unfamiliar with the slow movements of Beethoven’s late quartets; this is the most massive and, yes, symphonic of the movements, and the Raphael Ensemble play it superbly with an unhurried weight and assurance, sometimes suspending the melodic line on a thread of tone. The Finale is the most controversial of the movements in that it can evince elements of over-reaching and fussy complexity which threaten to fragment. Bruckner’s admiration of Bach is most in evidence here in the fugato elements of the second subject; the quiet control and sustained pulse of the Raphael Ensemble keep it together, rendering the movement unified and credible. The end comes with a glorious coda as the upper strings declaim over the grumbling scramble of the cellos.

I have to admit that as much as I value, esteem and enjoy the Quintet, I derive greatest pleasure from the vulgar indulgence and soaring ecstasy of the Prelude from Strauss’s “Capriccio” – but I am in incurable Strauss junkie.

Originally issued at full price on Hyperion CDA66704 in 1994, this is now a bargain issue on the Hyperion’s Helios label and worth every penny.

Ralph Moore

 

 

 


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






Untitled Document


Reviews from previous months
Join the mailing list and receive a hyperlinked weekly update on the discs reviewed. details
We welcome feedback on our reviews. Please use the Bulletin Board
Please paste in the first line of your comments the URL of the review to which you refer.