I'm pleased to be able to offer these two gorgeous, lush, yet chromatically piquant chamber works by Ernst von Dohnanyi. That they were even in their time backward rather than forward looking subtracts nothing from their innate musical value, which is considerable. Dohnanyi is pretty firmly ranked among composers of lesser importance, but his music is a treasure trove of melodic invention and craftsmanship of the highest order. If it is inspired by nineteenth century norms, it nonetheless takes them into the new century with full awareness, and the judicious, conservative utilization, of more advanced harmonic language. If his early class-mate, Bela Bartok, evolved into one of the century's most important musical creators, writing the most significant string quartets since, probably, Beethoven; still, Dohnanyi deserves a place at the table of music worth hearing. The quartet presented here lacks the emotional profundity of any of Bartok's in the same form; but it is tuneful, beautifully crafted, and invincibly lovely.
The Curtis Quartet is one group among Westminster Record's panoply of dependable musicians. Less well known than some of its contemporaries, it recorded numerous deeply satisfying performances for Westminster, the Franck Piano Quintet with the same Vladimir Sokoloff who plays in the Dohnanyi Quintet here being notable among them.
The folders posted contain both works. Tracks 1-4 being the quartet, 5-7 the Quintet. All the appropriate information is on the back CD insert.
Flac files
MP3 files
Folder with all files