Beethoven - The Late Quartets review | Andrew Clements classical album of the week

The Guardian 80

Brodsky Quartet
(Chandos, three CDs)
The Brodskys lend their distinctive virtues to these summits of the quartet repertory

The Brodsky Quartet have taken their time over the Beethoven quartets. In 2006, they released a disc of two of the Rasumovsky quartets, Opp 59 Nos 2 and 3, and followed that two years later with the Op 18 set, interleaving the six works with specially commissioned new pieces. Only now, for the beginning of Beethoven’s 250th-anniversary year, have they tackled the late quartets. Their set includes the F minor Quartet Op 95 as well as the works generally regarded as part of the “late” canon, Opp 127, 130 (with both of its finales), 131, 132 and 135. The recordings were made over a two-year period, before the departure of the group’s first violin, David Rowland, last year.