In my view, this recording contains music that should be in the collection of any serious classical music collector.
Beethoven:
String Quartets No. 1-6, Op. 18
String Quartet No. 7 in F major, Op. 59 No. 1 ‘Rasumovsky No. 1’
String Quartet No. 14 in C sharp minor, Op. 131
Mozart:
String Quartet No. 15 in D minor, K421
Performed by the Vlach Quartet
The eight Beethoven Quartets show us works from the composer’s early, mid, and late periods. All of them are wonderful, and one can notice the composer’s maturity and creative progress as he gets older.
The New Vlach Quartet performed in a line-up in which it conquered stages worldwide and made all the recordings featured on this album.
The New Vlach Quartet recorded Beethoven’s quartets within a 10 year period. Given the year in which it was recorded, 1956, the ”bonus” Mozart quatet in D minor is one of the ensemble’s oldest recordings made soon after their competition victory in Liege.
These recorded Beethoven tracks are merely part of the New Vlach Quartet’s remarkable legacy, which encompasses quartet works by Czech composers, as well as by Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Debussy and Ravel.
Here is the New Vlach Quartet in a performance of Dvorak’s Quartet Opus 34:
I believe there is some confusion here.
The Supraphon CD set referred to encompasses eight (8) Beethoven quartets, not three. And the recorded ensemble is not the same as (nor an earlier incarnation of) the quartet on the YouTube video.
The leaders of both quartets may be related (father and daughter!) but the quartets are not. The old quartet was named Vlach Quartet, the present-day ensemble is named either “Vlach Quartet Prague” (preferred) or “The New Vlach Quartet”.
Corrections have been made to fix the majority of these issues. Sorry.