Danish String Quartet: Prism V: Bach / Beethoven / Webern
ECM New Series

With its just-released fifth volume, the Danish String Quartet (DSQ) brings its inspired Prism series to a rewarding end. The brilliance of the concept violinists Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen and Frederik Øland, violist Asbjørn Nørgaard, and cellist Fredrik Schøyen Sjölin devised for the project is borne out by the results: in all cases, through-lines are established from a Bach fugue to one of Beethoven's last five quartets and finally the work of a later composer, in each case the music of one prismatically refracted through that of the others. Earlier chapters saw the DSQ couple Bach and Beethoven with, in sequence, Shostakovich, Schnittke, Bartók, and Mendelssohn, all four releases garnering significant critical praise for the exquisite musicianship of the quartet and its imaginative programming.

Initiating the fifth instalment is J. S. Bach's chorale prelude “Vor deinen Thron tret ich hiermit,” after which follows Beethoven's String Quartet No. 16 in F major and Anton Webern's early String Quartet, composed in 1905 and audibly indebted to Schoenberg; imposing a formally satisfying shape on the set is a performance of Bach's Contrapunctus XIV from The Art of the Fugue. Of the many takeaways, one worth mentioning is how comfortably the pieces sit alongside one another—-even if Webern's clearly separates itself from the others. Even so, its presence makes Beethoven's quartet feels more modern; his in turn makes Webern's seem a tad less radical when presented side-by-side. As a diverse programme should, particular aspects of the works are brought into sharper relief when conjoined, and they're experienced anew as a result. The recording also amplifies the fact that every composer is part of a continuum stretching across centuries.

That the DSQ plays telepathically doesn't surprise: its three Danish-born members first played together as pre-teens at a music summer camp and went on to make their first recordings in 2006 as the Young Danish String Quartet. Two years later, Norwegian cellist Sjölin joined the fold, and the quartet's membership has remained the same since. This latest release, recorded in June 2021in Copenhagen, is a superb addition to the group's discography.

Bach's “Vor deinen Thron tret ich hiermit” provides an entrancing way into the release, the four-minute setting marked by hymnal melancholy and dignified expression. The DSQ's rendition of Beethoven's sixteenth quartet bears out the group's contention that a late quartet by him is “an incredibly complicated and intricate piece of art” and that every bar and moment offers “a maze of possible interpretational paths.” The “Allegretto” opens the work in a relaxed mode, as if the players are readying themselves for the challenges ahead, and then quickly adopts a breezier quality. Moments of tranquil reflection arrest the forward momentum without sacrificing the movement's radiant character. After the robust “Vivace” barrels forth insistently, the slow third movement engages with poignant expressions of melancholy and grief, the DSQ demonstrating impeccable control in its pacing and tender voicing of the regal material. The “Grave, ma non troppo tratto” reinstates the singing tone of the second movement to guide the work to a spirited and satisfying resolution.

Traces of Schoenberg, with whom Webern had been studying since 1904, emerge in the young composer's String Quartet, Verklärte Nacht in particular. In contrast to the severely concentrated music Webern later composed, his string quartet—eighteen minutes in the DSQ's treatment—is expansive and explores the same kind of passionate emotional terrain as Verklärte Nacht. Presented as a single-movement work, Webern nevertheless conceived it as advancing through three stages, “Becoming,” “Being,” and “Passing Away.” There's angst aplenty in this sinuous creation, not to mention romantic intensity and passages hushed, haunting, and serene. The concluding Bach piece begins as quietly as the Webern ends. As Paul Griffiths notes in the release booklet, when Bach's heirs arranged for the publication of The Art of the Fugue, they didn't attempt to complete the unfinished Contrapunctus 141 and “left it hanging.” Its abrupt ending does jar, but it's otherwise a fitting bookend when its stateliness vividly echoes the opening chorale prelude.

August 2023