Luogo e data di registrazione		La Salle des Remparts, La Tour-de-Peilz (Svizzera): - 15-27 giugno 1971 (Schumann) - 15-27 gennaio 1971 (Brahms)
	Registrazione: live / studio		studio
	Producer / Engineer		Vittorio Negri | Tony Buczynski
	Edizione LP		Philips | 6503 061 | 1 LP
	Prima Edizione CD		Vedi link alla prima edizione in long playing.
	Note		La collana "Musica da Camera" della Philips riedita negli anni '80 alcune registrazioni del Quartetto Italiano.

It is an odd coincidence that Brahms and his friend and champio Schumann each published three string quartets, for where one might not have expected so many from Schumann, one would certainly have expected more from Brahms. Most of Schumann's work can be classified in periods which coincide with successive preoccupations. The year 1842 found him studying in depth the string quartets of Haydn and Mozart and his enthusiasm was the final creative impulse which led to the Op. 41 quartets. All three were dedicated to Mendelssohn, who was deeply impressed by their craftsmanship. The first two, on which Schumann worked simultaneously for a while, are similar in conception and form. The flanking movements of the second are in sonata form and are astonishingly concise in their expositions: the brief, unassuming second subjects seem to evolve naturally from the main themes and the links between the subjects are often underlined by juxtaposition in the development. Another unusual feature is the use of what might be described as "marker" passages, which signal the end of the developments and eventually return in the codas - in the first movement a series of piano/forte contrasts, and in the finale a sudden animato. A ternary scherzo and trio follow the slow movement, which presents a theme and five variations skilfully balanced in mood. The fact that Brahms delayed publication of his first two quartets (Op. 51) until 1873 when he was 40, was the result of a ruthlessly self-critical attitude towards his own work - particularly in the fields of the symphony and string quartet, those areas in which Beethoven was supreme. The third quartet, completed in 1875 and published the following year as Op. 67, is different from its predecessors. It seems that, having met the unspoken challenge of Beethoven to the best of his ability in Op. 51, Brahms relaxes in a work of almost pastoral character which draws its inspiration more from Haydn and Mozart. This is immediately apparent in the first movement where the basic conata-form contrasts are rhythmic rather than melodic or harmonic. Brahms employs three subject groups (the second and third presented in the dominant and recalled in the tonic). The separate elements of the Haydnesque first and third groups have quite distinct rhythms which Brahms delights in playing off against one another. The aria-like slow movement in F is in broad ABA form with powerful double stops adding drama to the central section. The D minor scherzo is really a passionate outpouring by the viola with a muted accompaniment, this continues in the trio, opening in A minor, and rest comes only in the coda which soothes the ruffled rhythms and coaxes the music into a peaceful D major close. The finale, again haunted by Haydn, is in the form of a theme and eight variations. In the seventh the opening theme of the first movement emerges and persists to the coda where it appears simultaneously with the finale theme in augmentation. A. David Hogarth

Illustration: Louis Eysen (1843-1899) "Sommerlandschaft", um 1875 (Städelsches Kunstinstitut, Frankfurt am Main)