Beethoven: String Quartets: Op 59 No. 1 ['Rasumovsky' No. 1] & Op 18 No. 6

"Music and music-making spectacular on all counts from 1972 (Op. 18) and 1973 (Op. 59) from Quartetto Italiano, who by the 1970s had come to represent the avantgarde among chamber ensembles in revisionist, linear style. Razor-wire intonation, fierce attacks, rhythmic propulsion, and a steadiness of inner pulsation made this foursome the multiplied version to strings what Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli had achieved for the keyboard. In surround sound, the brilliant figures and explosive dynamics that mark Beethoven's equal distribution of parts, the ongoing dialogue of musical principals, becomes a ravishing series of conversations and epiphanies in music's most intimate medium." (AudAud.com Feb 2009)

Beethoven wrote the six quartets Op. 18 between 1798 and 1800, and dedicated them to Prince Franz Joseph Lobkowitz. Thus, he remained faithful to the Baroque tradition of compiling six distinctive works in a cycle. The order in which he wrote the works actually differs to that in which they were published: i.e. Nos. 3, 1, 2, 5, 4, 6. His Op. 18 proved Beethoven to be a representative of the Viennese Classical era equal to Haydn and Mozart.