Credits:

Elfman, Danny

Description:

This is the debut recording of the Maxwell String Quartet, which was formed in the UK in 2010 and won the Audience Prize at the Trondheim International Chamber Music Competition in 2017 (with a guest recording on the accordionist's CD in 2016). The quartet's originality is expressed by combining the first three pieces (Op. 71) of the "Apony Quartet," which Haydn began writing shortly after his return to Vienna from his first trip to England, with traditional music from his native Scotland, which must have influenced not only the musicians who perform it but also the composer himself. Simon Fraser, Neil Gow, and James Scott Skinner are all famous fiddle players of their times, and the oldest piece, "Beloved Gregor," is a beautiful lament sung in Celtic (Gaelic) to her husband who died in the war. In Haydn's three quartets, he gave a pleasing performance that made one greatly aware of the characteristics of each: No. 69, in which rapture envelops the whole, No. 70, which is lyrical and romantic, and No. 71, which has an expression of great amplitude. This is a piece in which one can enjoy the young and brilliant expression and tone of the music. Naxos Japan