Rott and Bruckner Quartets

[petershott@btinternet.com]

Has anyone yet caught sight of a new CD in which the Israel Quartet perform the Bruckner C minor and Hans Rott string quartets?

The CD is issued by a label new to me - Quintone - and it was advertised (by MDT and more cheaply by HMV) as being available from the start of January.

My usual supplier keeps telling me 'out of stock', and I presume that means supplies of the CD have not been received. There is no sign of it on Amazon UK. Hopefully the CD exists in the real world rather than subsists in an ideal world.

I'm not losing too much sleep over the early Bruckner quartet (there is a very splendid recent recording of it by the Fine Arts Qt on Naxos). But I am starting to foam at the mouth by being frustrated in hearing the Rott quartet.

[britishcomposer]

Peter, don't bother with the Israel Quartet recording. True, it's polished playing but I miss the fire! I have uploaded a performance by the Rosamunde Quartet of 1998.

[eschiss1]

Thanks!
For some information about the quartet by the way see this page at Hans-Rott.de .

[Paul Barasi]

Rosamunde = 4 movements (omits the 4th movement: Minuet). Mainzer SQ/Acousence ACO-CD 20205 + Mandelring SQ/Real Sound (Toblach box set) RS 053-0116 both = the full 5 movements.

[britishcomposer]

Damn! I didn't realise this! The Rott website doesn't mention it... 
BTW, the recording by the Israel Quartet is in the archive of Concertzender. It contains the Minuet.

Paul, which of the two recordings would you recommend?

[Paul Barasi]

If I could have only one it would be Mandelring. This seems to my ears a very special performance, majestically in a league of its own. There's something about a collective group conscience of the work's conception in its entirely (they all get it, they get it all, they get it together).  It's beautifully played and more fully brings out the texture.

Mainzer is simply well played, especially in the second movement and towards the end, but it somehow sounds less substance and less cohesive. I prefer either to Rosamunde.  However with Mandelring, there is the question of cost for a 3 CD set, especially if you may not be especially interested in or taken by the rest of the box.

The minuet movement is actually less than 2 minutes long and not without controversy concerning its place in the work given the thin manuscript evidence for the quartet. Some have thought it was a possible alternative movement to the little scherzo but post-Rosamunde the work has been performed in 5 movements. As for me,  I grab all the Rott I can get, but my preferences would still stand regardless of the minuet.