BaL 29.10.16 - Brahms: String Sextet No.1 in B flat major, Op. 18

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

0930
Building a Library: Katy Hamilton recommends a recorded version of Brahms’s String Sextet No.1 in B flat major, Op. 18, composed in 1860. It is scored for two violins, two violas, and two cellos.This was quite an unusual combination of instruments at the time Brahms wrote the piece.

Available recordings:

Academy of St Martin in the Fields Chamber Ensemble
Alberni String Quartet, Roger Best & Moray Welsh
Alexander String Quartet, Tony Appel, David Requiro
Amadeus Quartet, Cecil Aronowitz, William Pleeth
L’Archibudelli
Augustin Dumay, Miguela da Silva, Svetlin Roussev, Henri Demarquette, Marie Chilemme, Aurelien Pascal
Bartók Quartet, György Konrád), Ede Banda (download)
Busch Quartet (download)
Camerata Quartet, Michal Styczynski, Adam Klocek (download)
Hausmusik London
Juilliard Quartet, Walter Trampler, Leslie Parnas
Kocian Quartet, Josef Kluson, Michal Kanka
Hartmut Rohde (viola), Michael Sanderling (violoncello
Leipziger Streichquartett, etc.
Lindsay Quartet, Louise Williams, Paul Watkin
Silke-Thora Matthies & Christian Köhn (piano duo)
Yehudi Menuhin, Robert Masters, Ernst Wallfisch, Cecil Aronowitz, Derek Simpson, Maurice Gendron (download)
Nash Ensemble
Quatuor Prazak, Petr Holman & Vladimír Fortin
Quatuor Sine Nomine, Nicolas Pache, Francois Guye
Raphael Ensemble
Isaac Stern, Pablo Casals, Milton Katims, Milton Thomas, Madeline Foley, Alexander Schneider
Isaac Stern, Cho-Liang Lin, Michael Tree, Jaime Laredo, Yo-Yo Ma, Sharon Robinson (download)
Stuttgart Soloists
Talich Quartet, Michal Kanka & Josef Kluson
Vienna Konzerthaus Quartet
Trio Jean Paul (arr. Theodor Kirchner)
Trio Parnassus
Trio Stradivari (arr. Theodor Kirchner) (download)
Verdi Quartett, Hermann Voss, Peter Buck
Vienna Konzerthaus Quartet (download)

[BBMmk2]

Strangely enough, I haven't come around to this work. So I be rather interested, particularly, if there are any others floating around!

[vinteuil]

I love this work.

I have the Amadeus/Aronowitz/Pleeth , and (my current favourite) l' Archibudelli, plus the very interesting piano duet version with Silke-Thora Matthies & Christian Köhn. (The naxos series of Brahms piano-four-hands has been so enlightening, marvellous.)

I think I shall have to investigate the Hausmusik recording...

[Gordon]

Lovely work!! Looking forward to this one. Interesting combination of instruments repeated by Dvorak in his sextet Op48 but 20 years after Brahms. This is also well worth a listen.

I've had the Raphael for many years now [coupling is the other sextet] but suspect I may be heading for another version!

I wonder, seeing so many quartets in this list, whether, in this age of recording, any were tempted to play with themselves by having the viola and cello add the 5/6th parts afterwards?

[vinteuil]

I wonder ... whether .... any were tempted to play with themselves ...

indeed

[Richard Barrett]

(my current favourite) l' Archibudelli

The first time I heard the work was in this recording, and it was the first time I found something to appreciate in Brahms. There are still only a very few works of his that I'm ever interested in listening to, and this is still one of them. Some time later I chanced on a radio broadcast of another performance, I don't remember the performers except Casals was the "extra" cellist; and found it so ponderous and overcooked that I thought if I'd heard that one first I'd never have wanted to have anything to do with the piece again. But... the first movement in particular gets to me in a way nothing else of Brahms does.

[Daniel]

Lovely work!!

Yes indeed! A piece that has proved constant here, throughout various Brahms waxings and wanings. It has an irresistible spontaneity and seems to soar in a way that for me not too much Brahms manages.

I have the Raphael Ensemble too, as well as the Stuttgart Soloists on Naxos and know various others from listening online. Will listen with interest.

[kernelbogey]

Both Brahms sextets are gorgeous, IMV.

[visualnickmos]

I have the Raphael Ensemble too, as well as the Stuttgart Soloists on Naxos and know various others from listening online. Will listen with interest.

This is a most enjoyable recording - I have it, and also Stern, Lin, Laredo, Tree, Robinson on Sony. What's the Stuttgart Soloists recording like? A worthy 'contender' perhaps, in your opinion...?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Both Brahms sextets are gorgeous, IMV.

MV2

[Gordon]

indeed

As Dick Emery might have said: You are naughty....

2 quartets with no named extra players are listed by Alpie above so...

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

2 quartets with no named extra players are listed by Alpie above so...

... they just couldn't afford the extra players.

[Richard Tarleton]

I also think both sextets are gorgeous, esp. no 1. Only one version on CD - Academy of St M in the F (Ken Sillito and co) tho I heard a lovely live performance at the 2014 Aldeburgh Festival - can't find the programme as I'm redecorating so can't tell you who by.....

PS Found the programme, it was the Arcanto Quartet, who record for Harmonia Mundi - but the prog doesn't credit the extra players...

[pastoralguy]

The Brahms' sextets are, possibly, my all time favourite chamber works to both listen to and to play. My introduction to this wonderful music was back in 1979 when the slow movement was used as introduction music to a BBC Radio 3 play called ' The Tennent of Wildfell Hall'. The play made no impression but I thought the music was terrific! Mind you, I thought it had been written specially for the broadcast and had no idea it was written by Brahms. It was only a year or so later I accidentally heard it on the Radio and recognised it.

Alas, there's no mention of my first Lp which was a CfP disc of the Principals of the LPO led by Rodney Friend which is still my favourite version. No, it's not the most polished version but I think the music's joy comes shining through.

I eventually bought the music and used to take it to string quartet weekends praying that a 'cellist and and viola player could be found on a Saturday afternoon when there was an optional 'free choice' option offered. I dreaded a second viola player not being available which would, inevitably, result in Schubert's boring Quintet being played. (The second fiddle part is NOT the most interesting!)

[kea]

I also feel like L'Archibudelli capture something quite special in this work that not many other performers do (until hearing their recording I'd thought of the Op. 18 as nice but definitely the inferior of Op. 36—which, however, they also capture something special in). Hard pressed to name exactly what it is—of course there's the sound, gut strings on Stradivarius instruments and all that, and how close it is to what Brahms would have wanted if he could get hold of it, but I think it's also a particular attitude towards articulation and dynamics.

Also worth noting that the Talich Quartet & friends turn in a performance of the slow movement that puts a lot of emphasis on its Hungarian quality, something I generally have a lot of time for.