String Quartets Vol. 1

The Doric String Quartet is firmly established as one of the leading quartets of it's generation, receiving enthusiastic responses from audiences and critics around the globe. Celebrating their 25th anniversary, the Quartet here embarks on a significant new recording project - the complete string quartets by Beethoven. This first volume combines works from Beethoven's early, middle, and late period. The six quartets Op. 18 were the first he composed, in 1799 and 1800, encouraged by Prince Franz Joseph Maximilian von Lobkowitz, a significant patron of the arts. Once he had completed the set, Beethoven heavily revised the first three quartets, writing to a friend: 'I have changed it considerably; for I have only now learned to write quartets correctly, as you will see when you receive them.' Andrey Kirillovich Razumovsky was the Russian ambassador to the Vieneese court, and the dedicatee of the three quartets Op. 59. The last of the middle-period quartets, Op. 95 (Serioso) was dedicated to Beethoven's close friend and accomplished cellist Nikolaus Zmeskall and is regarded as showing a glimpse of what would come: Beethoven's late quartets. Extremely complex and largely misunderstood by musicians and audiences in Beethoven's day, these quartets are now widely considered to be among the greatest musical compositions of all time, and have inspired many later composers. Op. 127, featured in this volume, is the first of these monumental works