Brahms: Piano Quartets Nos. 2 & 3 in Bloomington, MN

The final recordings of pianist
Lars Vogt
, who passed away from cancer in 2022, have offered many riches, but this one is arguably the most profound of all. The quartet of violinist
Christian Tetzlaff
, violist
Barbara Buntrock
, cellist
Tanja Tetzlaff
, and
Vogt
had planned to record all three
Brahms
piano quartets, but the first quartet and the intended studio recording of the
Piano Quartet No. 3 in C minor, Op. 60
, could not be completed; the
C minor quartet
is taken from a live performance. For listeners, this is all to the good; this may be the most intense recording of the
on recordings. Sample the first movement, where the awesomely pregnant opening material is given a level of tension that stretches it almost, but not quite, to the breaking point. There are many deeply spiritual moments in the quartet, beginning with the revelatory quality of the second subject group's emergence in the first movement. Spiritual, too, is the contrast of the deeply serious and harmonically daring
with the
Piano Quartet No. 2 in A major, Op. 26
, a work that alternates between Mozartian grace and a dreamy quality close to unique in
' oeuvre. In both works, the coordination among the players, most of whom have worked closely together before, evinces a joy that characterizes the highest ideals of chamber music. This profoundly powerful recording is a fitting memorial to
and a remarkable chamber music artifact; it made classical best-seller charts in the summer of 2024. ~ James Manheim