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Mozart, String Quartets Vol. 4
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Armida Quartett

Mozart, String Quartets Vol. 4

Price: € 19.95
Format: CD
Label: CAvi
UPC: 4260085532056
Catnr: AVI 8553205
Release date: 03 December 2021
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Label
CAvi
UPC
4260085532056
Catalogue number
AVI 8553205
Release date
03 December 2021
Album
Artist(s)
Composer(s)
EN
DE

About the album

MOZART Vol. IV
…..The Armida Quartet endeavors to find dissonances lying like sleeping metaphors on the seabed of Mozart’s music, in order to bring them to the surface and back to life – yet without making them too obvious.

In so doing, the musicians commit themselves to follow the original sources, which they are intensely studying in collaboration with expert
musicological counsel. But they are also committed to their chosen name, “Armida”, which evokes a widespread opera subject stemming from Torquato Tasso’s epic poem Gerusalemme liberata (“Jerusalem Delivered”).

In that well-known story, Armida stands for what we would call cognitive dissonance. The Christian knight from the West and the pagan beauty from the East are fascinated with one another and fall in love. Despite her infatuation, however, Armida must surely also be an evil sorceress, since she is distracting Rinaldo, the crusader, from his holy mission of war. Armida’s final submission is sealed once and for all with a battle victory and a baptism: this is obviously a Western projection we need to view with a greater deal of nuance.

With its apparently irresolvable dissonance arising from contradictory feelings, the fear caused by the seductive outer appearance of beauty, and the ostensibly unappealable validity of cultural norms, the fictional Armida material is a true aesthetic and cultural litmus test…… ….. (Excerpt from the booklet notes by Hansjörg Ewert)
Mozart verwendete die Tonart C-Dur häufig, wenn es ihm um eine besonders wichtige harmonische Palette ging. Ein Höhepunkt seiner Kompositionen in C ist das sogenannte „Dissonanzenquartett“, dessen langsame Einleitung die Kunst des chromatischen Vorhalts, das Changieren zwischen Dur und Moll ins Extrem treibt. Gestrenge Zeitgenossen nahmen daran Anstoß, worauf der Beinamen zurückzuführen ist. Das Armida Quartett kombiniert dieses sechste der „dem lieben Haydn“ gewidmeten Quartette aus den frühen 1780er-Jahren mit drei der zehn Jahre früher entstandenen sogenannten Mailänder Quartette

Artist(s)

Armida Quartet

ARMIDA QUARTETT Martin Funda Violin Johanna Staemmler Violin Teresa Schwamm Viola Peter-Philipp Staemmler Cello A triumph, both technically and musically. BBC Music Magazine, March 2021 Winning the ARD International Competition in 2012 (also sweeping all other prizes including the audience prize) propelled the Armida Quartet on to the international concert platform. After concerts and radio recordings as BBC New Generation Artists (2014-16) and subsequently as ECHO Rising Stars (2016/17), the musicians have established themselves as regular guests in the best-known chamber music halls in Europe, Asia, and the USA. In addition to regular appearances at European festivals such as the Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and the Rheingau Musik Festival, the quartet has enjoyed great success at the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, the Berlin Philharmonie, and London‘s Wigmore Hall, among others. Acclaimed for their musical unity, which is evident in...
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ARMIDA QUARTETT Martin Funda Violin Johanna Staemmler Violin Teresa Schwamm Viola Peter-Philipp Staemmler Cello A triumph, both technically and musically. BBC Music Magazine, March 2021 Winning the ARD International Competition in 2012 (also sweeping all other prizes including the audience prize) propelled the Armida Quartet on to the international concert platform. After concerts and radio recordings as BBC New Generation Artists (2014-16) and subsequently as ECHO Rising Stars (2016/17), the musicians have established themselves as regular guests in the best-known chamber music halls in Europe, Asia, and the USA.
In addition to regular appearances at European festivals such as the Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and the Rheingau Musik Festival, the quartet has enjoyed great success at the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, the Berlin Philharmonie, and London‘s Wigmore Hall, among others.
Acclaimed for their musical unity, which is evident in their fine-tuned sound and timing as well as their shared breaths, the musicians also emphasise their commitment to quartet playing with their choice of ensemble name: Armida refers to an opera by the composer Joseph Haydn, who is considered the „father of the string quartet“. They studied with former members of the Artemis Quartet and with Rainer Schmidt (Hagen Quartet); they owe further important impulses to Reinhard Goebel, Alfred Brendel, Marek Janowski, and Tabea Zimmermann.
The Armida Quartet places a special focus on the works of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The recently released third album of the on-going complete recordings of his string quartets for CAvi Records was praised as „musically ravishing and sonically (...) exemplary“, and described as ground-breaking for Mozart interpretation in the 21st century (Klassik Heute 1/2021).
The ensemble pursues its passion for Mozart, among other things, in its own concert series Mozart Exploded, in which each of the composer‘s string quartets are combined with masterpieces of contemporary music and occasionally presented in experimental concert formats in Berlin.
The series has already been enthusiastically received in New York as well. In addition, the young musicians have cooperated with G. Henle Verlag, for whom they act as musical advisors for the new Urtext edition of the Mozart quartets, including their own fingerings and bowings made available for the associated Henle Library App. In doing so, the quartet is not only at the forefront of the latest technological developments, but also advocates for closer collaboration between performing artists and musicologists.
Whether in its curatorial functions or on stage, collaboration with other artists is a priority for the Armida Quartet. They have a special relationship with the Serbian composer Marko Nikodijevi´c, whose first and second String Quartets they premiered. In the meantime, however, musicians such as Thomas Hampson, Martin Fröst, Tabea Zimmermann, Jörg Widmann, Julian Steckel, Sabine Meyer, and Daniel Müller-Schott have also become regular partners. In addition, the ensemble gives master classes in Germany as well as abroad and is committed to social and educational institutions, including initiatives such as Rhapsody in School and Yehudi Menuhin Live Music Now.
Along with the three albums of Mozart string quartets already released, the quartet‘s discography also includes their debut CD with works by Béla Bartók, György Ligeti, and György Kurtág (CAvi), released in 2013, which was included in the German Record Prize‘s Best List. A recording with works by Beethoven and Shostakovich was also released by CAvi in 2016, followed in 2017 by Fuga Magna with works by Scarlatti, Bach, Goldberg, Mozart, and Beethoven.
The quartet has also participated in various compilations of contemporary works by Samy Moussa, Ursula Mamlok, Birke J. Bertelsmeier, and Milica Djordjevi´c, among others.

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Composer(s)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, whose actual name is Joannes Chrysotomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a composer, pianist, violinist and conductor from the classical period, born in Salzburg. Mozart was a child prodigy. Already competent on keyboard and violin, he composed from the age of five and performed before European royalty. Along with Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven, Mozart is considered to be one of the most influential composers of all of music's history. Within the classical tradition, he was able to develop new musical concepts which left an everlasting impression on all the composers that came after him. Together with Joseph Haydn and Ludwig van Beethoven he is part of the First Viennese School.  At 17, Mozart was engaged as...
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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, whose actual name is Joannes Chrysotomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a composer, pianist, violinist and conductor from the classical period, born in Salzburg. Mozart was a child prodigy. Already competent on keyboard and violin, he composed from the age of five and performed before European royalty. Along with Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven, Mozart is considered to be one of the most influential composers of all of music's history. Within the classical tradition, he was able to develop new musical concepts which left an everlasting impression on all the composers that came after him. Together with Joseph Haydn and Ludwig van Beethoven he is part of the First Viennese School. At 17, Mozart was engaged as a musician at the Salzburg court, but grew restless and traveled in search of a better position. From 1763 he traveled with his family through all of Europe for three years and from 1769 he traveled to Italy and France with his father Leopold after which he took residence in Paris. On July 3rd, 1778, his mother passed away and after a short stay in Munich with the Weber family, his father urged him to return to Salzburg, where he was once again hired by the Bishop. While visiting Vienna in 1781, he was dismissed from his Salzburg position. He chose to stay in the capital, where he achieved fame but little financial security. During his final years in Vienna, he composed many of his best-known symphonies, concertos, and operas, and portions of the Requiem, which was largely unfinished at the time of his death.


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Press

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01.
String Quartet No. 4 in C Major K. 157 (1770) : I. Allegro
05:12
(Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) Armida Quartet
02.
String Quartet No. 4 in C Major K. 157 (1770): II. Andante
04:39
(Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) Armida Quartet
03.
String Quartet No. 4 in C Major K. 157 (1770): III. Presto
01:42
(Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) Armida Quartet
04.
Streichquartett / String Quartet No. 6 B-Dur / in B flat Major K. 159 (1773) : I. Andante
04:03
(Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) Armida Quartet
05.
Streichquartett / String Quartet No. 6 B-Dur / in B flat Major K. 159 (1773) : II. Allegro
04:37
(Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) Armida Quartet
06.
Streichquartett / String Quartet No. 6 B-Dur / in B flat Major K. 159 (1773) : III. Rondo. Allegro grazioso
02:42
(Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) Armida Quartet
07.
Streichquartett / String Quartet No. 7 Es-Dur / in E flat Major K. 160 (1773) : I. Allegro
03:06
(Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) Armida Quartet
08.
Streichquartett / String Quartet No. 7 Es-Dur / in E flat Major K. 160 (1773) : II. Un poco adagio
04:30
(Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) Armida Quartet
09.
Streichquartett / String Quartet No. 7 Es-Dur / in E flat Major K. 160 (1773) : III. Presto
02:34
(Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) Armida Quartet
10.
Streichquartett / String Quartet No. 19 C-Dur / in C Major K. 465 (1785) Dissonance : I. Adagio - Allegro
10:15
(Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) Armida Quartet
11.
Streichquartett / String Quartet No. 19 C-Dur / in C Major K. 465 (1785) Dissonance : II. Andante cantabile
06:16
(Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) Armida Quartet
12.
Streichquartett / String Quartet No. 19 C-Dur / in C Major K. 465 (1785) Dissonance : III. Menuetto. Allegretto - Trio
05:26
(Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) Armida Quartet
13.
Streichquartett / String Quartet No. 19 C-Dur / in C Major K. 465 (1785) Dissonance : IV. Allegro molto
07:20
(Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) Armida Quartet
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