Credits:

Engegard Quartet

Description:

A new-look Engegrd Quartet, with Brendel’s son on celloThe Engegrd Quartet was formed in 2006 in Lofoten, Norway, under the midnight sun, and this is the third volume in its string quartet series, following Volume 1 with Haydn’s D major quartet, Leif Solberg and Grieg (2L53SACD) and Volume 2 with Beethoven’s “Harp”, Nordheim and Bartk’s Third (2L071SACD). The programme comprises Haydn’s Op. 77 No. 1, from the last set of quartets he wrote, at the request of Prince Lobkowitz; Nordheim’s duo Duplex, which the composer described as “a play of contrasts and extremes” (in three movements, “Energico”, “Fluente” and “Lento cantando – Energico”, written for Stefan Barratt-Due and Soon-Mi Chung, the married couple who run a music school in Oslo, and one of the most immediately approachable of all Nordheim’s works); and Bartk’s Fifth Quartet, which Engegrd was introduced to by Sndor Vgh, the music di