R Schumann: Piano Quartet; Piano Quintet*
Isabelle Faust (violin), *Anne Katharina Schreiber (violin), Jean-Guihen Queyras (cello), Antoine Tamestit (viola), Alexander Melnikov (piano)
Harmonia Mundi HMM902695 54:42 mins
Schumann composed his Piano Quintet and Piano Quartet in quick succession in the late autumn of 1842, a year in which he was preoccupied with chamber music. The quartet has always lived in the shadow of its more popular companion, but in many ways it’s a more subtle and original work. Its themes are more flexible and rhapsodic than the sometimes four-square ideas in the quintet, and they’re generally developed more inventively and less repetitively. The scherzo is a highly original and seamless piece in which fragments invade the territory of both the contrasting trio sections. Only the somewhat sentimental slow movement disappoints, but even here Schumann conjures up a fascinating idea for the closing moments, where the cello, which has tuned its bottom string down by a whole tone, sustains a low octave while the remaining players anticipate in slow motion the main subject of the finale to come.
Hearing these pieces played with such consummate artistry is a genuine pleasure. The translucent quality of the 1851 Pleyel piano Alexander Melnikov uses may take a bit of getting used to, but the lightness of its tone enables the string parts to come through with exceptional clarity. The finale of the quartet, with its fleeting contrapuntal figure seeming to recall the concluding fugue in Beethoven’s ‘Hammerklavier’ sonata, is played with dazzling virtuosity, but there’s a real sense of enjoyment about the music-making that makes itself felt throughout these performances. Misha Donat
