Mendelssohn: Octet for Strings op 20 (with Boccherini - Cello Quintet Op 37 No 7)
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MENDELSSOHN
Mendelssohn: Octet for Strings op 20 (with Boccherini - Cello Quintet Op 37 No 7)
Academy of St. Martin in th Fields
[ Decca Australian SBS Eloquence / CD ]
Release Date: Sunday 20 September 2015
Mendelssohn's Octet, Op. 20 occupies a proud place in the history of works by indecently young composers; it is doubtful whether even such prodigies as Mozart and Schubert produced such an extended, mature work at the age of sixteen. Moreover, one of its movements granted the composer the honour of having an adjective named after him pass into common use - for this Scherzo Mendelssohnian is the only appropriate description. The coupling on this legendary recording - selected for inclusion by the Penguin Guide to the 1000 Finest Classical Recordings - is the much rarer Boccherini Quintet, is, like much of his music, gentle and genial… a quality that led to a contemporary once waspishly describing him as 'Haydn's wife'.
"To the recording's qualifications as "legendary" there is no argument. The Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields players (Neville Marriner on violin among them) are superb in the young Mendelssohn's dense, rich, but rather unwieldy octet...The high-tech remastering vaunted here does its job; the sound matches the standards of a well-engineered LP from the late 1960s. This is a recording that was fresh in its own time and has lost none of its freshness today." (All Music Guide)
"the whole work is splendidly done […] There is a knife-edge tautness about their performance [of the Scherzo] that is extraordinarily gripping' (Mendelssohn) […] the minuet is a lollipop, at least as pretty as the Boccherini minuet … All in all, then, this is a most enjoyable work and very well played by all concerned. And very well recorded too." (Gramophone on the Boccherini)
"When you hear the superbly ebullient, well phrased and sensitive opening to the Octet in this clear, well balanced and very lifelike recording it is hard to believe that it was recorded nearly half a century ago." (MusicWeb)
Tracks:
Boccherini:
Quintet in C major for Cello & Strings, Op. 37, No. 7
Mendelssohn:
Octet in E flat major, Op. 20
