Composer Joseph Haydn was an innovator. He created style for chamber music that influenced composers of string quartets for years after Haydn died.
Now we have a performance group that brings us illustrations of Haydn’s genius:
Haydn: String Quartets, Op. 50 Nos. 1-6 (complete)
Performed from the Artaria edition published in Vienna in December 1787 by the London Haydn Quartet.
The London Haydn Quartet shows us that the six Op 50 quartets are more serious than the Op 33 ‘Russian’ quartets which they follow in Haydn’s output.
The BBC Music Magazine wrote:
“gut strings and paucity of vibrato notwithstanding, [the London Haydn Quartet] play with all the radiant resonance of timbre of their previous releases in this on-going Haydn series…there is never a dull moment, and the recording is of answering immediacy and bloom”
Here is the London Haydn Quartet playing extracts from this recording:
