{"id":8608,"date":"2012-12-19T16:34:56","date_gmt":"2012-12-19T21:34:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/?p=8608"},"modified":"2012-12-19T16:34:56","modified_gmt":"2012-12-19T21:34:56","slug":"daily-album-review-33-ebene-quartets-elegant-take-on-two-faure-piano-quintets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/2012\/12\/19\/daily-album-review-33-ebene-quartets-elegant-take-on-two-faure-piano-quintets\/","title":{"rendered":"Daily album review 33: Eb\u00e8ne Quartet’s elegant take on two Faur\u00e9 piano quintets"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"faure\"<\/a>French pianist Eric Le Sage has teamed up with Quatuor Eb\u00e8ne to make a deeply felt, elegantly rendered album featuring the two piano quintets of Gabriel Faur\u00e9 (1845-1924).<\/p>\n

What a sea change in music through that lifetime: Faur\u00e9 was 4 when Chopin died and 63 when Arnold Schoenberg composed his atonal String Quartet No. 2<\/em> in 1908.<\/p>\n

Faur\u00e9 completed the first of the quintets, Op. 89, in 1906, after 20 years of false starts. It had a lukewarm reception (Faur\u00e9 himself played the piano part, with the legendary Eug\u00e8ne Ysa\u00ffe and his quartet) and was forgotten after it was published in the United States.<\/p>\n

The second work, Op. 115, is the product of a frail, nearly deaf 76-year-old yet is a far more robust piece of music. It had its premiere in the spring of 1921.<\/p>\n

\"Quatuor<\/a>
Quatuor Eb\u00e8ne.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Neither piece is adventurous, yet there’s really nothing else like them.<\/p>\n

The Op. 89 Quintet<\/em> meanders through three movements that don’t always have a lot of momentum but are jewels of fine contrapuntal writing for all the instruments.<\/p>\n

The Op. 115 Quintet is more impassioned, rarely attached to a fixed key, yet beautifully developed over four movements. This is the sort of colourful, atmospheric, emotionally charged music that speaks to late Romanticism as well as Impressionism.<\/p>\n

The Eb\u00e8nes and Le Sage are nothing short of magnificent in their interpretations — all steel fists and bows in velvet gloves, ideally balanced, attuned to each other as if they are one organism.<\/p>\n

This album is a real treat, the third in a planned full survey of the chamber music of Gabriel Faur\u00e9 by the Alpha label (some details here<\/a>).<\/p>\n

For a taste of the Op. 89 quintet, here are three magical minutes of the Eb\u00e8nes with pianist Michael Dalberto:<\/p>\n