BUSCH QUARTET Beethoven: The Late Quartets (1933-42) – PACM093 pas cheres

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BUSCH QUARTET Beethoven: The Late Quartets (1933-42) – PACM093
overviewfb55cd020f0643f08418183279e63a5fBEETHOVEN String Quartets Nos. 7, 12-16

The Busch Quartet

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Reviewing this set of Beethoven’s late quartets
performed by one of yesteryear’s pre-eminent string quartet ensembles
requires me to make an exception to my longstanding, and by now
tiresome, pledge not to review recordings of these works wherein the Grosse Fuge
from the op. 130 Quartet is shifted to after the alternate finale or
worse, placed on another disc altogether. Neither is the case here,
since the Grosse Fuge is nowhere to be found on these three discs. Whether the Busch String Quartet ever recorded the Grosse Fuge
in its original form, I don’t know, but the ensemble did record it in
an arrangement by Felix Weingartner, which was included in a three-disc
EMI set of the complete late quartets, reviewed by Mortimer Frank in
31:6.

As Frank and other Fanfare
reviewers have noted, these Busch Beethoven studio recordings, made
between 1933 and 1942, have long circulated in various configurations on
various labels—Biddulph, Dutton, CBS/Sony, EMI, and Preiser. These are
the same recordings at hand, cleaned up, of course, and remastered by
Andrew Rose for these Pristine discs.

If you’re already familiar with the performances
on one or another of the above-named labels, your only question is
likely to be about the sound of these Pristine restorations; and on that
count I can tell you that what Rose has achieved is quite remarkable.

No, you won’t think you’re listening to the latest
SACD to come off the press, but comparing Pristine’s “XR” processing to
the Dutton transfers I’ve heard, Pristine’s sound is definitely more
open (i.e., not as damped sounding), lending greater separation to the
voices, and providing an extended sense, perhaps perceived rather than
actual, of high and low frequency response. Purely on the merits of
recorded sound, these Pristine versions are superior and preferable to
the Dutton versions I’ve heard. I can’t speak to the Biddulph transfers
because I haven’t heard them.

If you’re not already familiar with the
performances, I can tell you that the Busch Quartet was in its prime and
recording these Beethoven quartets at virtually the same time that its
approximately contemporaneous rival, the Budapest String Quartet, was
recording some of its earliest Beethoven, also in the mid-1930s. Those
performances, recorded in London by HMV, can be heard in transfers on
Biddulph, and comparison to the Busch Quartet in terms of aesthetic
style and approach is instructive.

One already hears in the Budapest’s playing
readings that are transitioning to a more modern interpretive stance and
understanding of the music. Tempos are a bit swifter, there’s less
portamento, and vibrato is more modulated in accordance with dynamic and
expressive markings. The Busch’s readings, in contrast, project a
warmth that’s somewhat downplayed in the Budapest’s readings, and it’s
that warmth that gives the Busch’s performances a wonderful inner glow
and feeling of devout concentration. But by today’s standards, the
unalleviated vibrato and especially the profusion of portamento—too few
position shifts and intervals of greater than a third are navigated
without a slide—really do become cloying in fairly short order.

As exemplars of mid-1930s performance practices,
the Busch’s Beethoven is unmatched. Accepted on their own terms, these
readings represent the very best in string quartet playing of their
time, and these magnificent Pristine refurbishments enhance our
understanding of why this ensemble was—and for many still is—so highly
regarded. Jerry Dubins

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Pioneering Busch String Quartet brilliant with Brahms

« The Busch Quartet are at the top of their form … exceedingly good » – The Gramophone

These recordings of the late quartets of Beethoven were recorded in
HMV at Abbey Road Studios between 1935 and 1937, supplemented by
Columbia’s recordings of 1941/42 at the Liederkranz Hall in New York
City. As with some previous Pristine restorations I’ve found the best
results have come from LP transcriptions of the original 78s,
transferred and issued in the days before digital remastering. With
limited options for improving sound quality, the onus on engineers was
to get the very best from the original masters, often by either playing
the metal plates directly or by pressing quiet vinyl copies from them in
order to make their transfers. Although it’s unclear here which methods
were used, both the CBS and EMI vinyl reissues of later decades proved
excellent starting points for the present set.

In each case XR remastering has made significant improvements in
sound quality, with the higher frequencies now far clearer than before,
especially in the otherwise better-recorded Columbia takes. The slightly
boxy sound of the HMV studio recordings has also opened out
considerably, and overall the impression is of a much fuller, richer and
more dynamic sound than might be anticipated from recordings of this
era.

The pitching of the original transfers varied considerably. There was
also some pitch variance within individual recordings. Here I’ve chosen
to pitch all of the recordings to standard concert pitch. The use of
pitch stabilisation software has also enabled the elimination of wow
from the original discs, as well as other pitch anomalies.

The Late Quartets don’t normally include the 7th Quartet; with the
five quartets, 12-16, complete there was a perfect Quartet No. 7-sized
gap in CD1, hence its inclusion here.

Andrew Rose

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• BEETHOVEN Quartet No. 7 in F, Op. 59, No. 1 « Rasumovsky »
  Recorded 15/25 May 1942, Liederkranz Hall, New York
  Cat. Nos. Columbia 71474-D – 71479-D
  Matrices XCO.32832-37; 32869-73

• BEETHOVEN Quartet No. 12 in E flat, Op.127
  Recorded 2/16/17 November 1936, Abbey Road Studio 3
  Cat. Nos. HMV DB.3044-48
  Matrices 2EA.4401-07
   
• BEETHOVEN Quartet No. 13 in B flat, Op.130
  Recorded 13/16 June 1941, Liederkranz Hall, New York
  Cat. Nos. Columbia 71220-D – 71224-D
  Matrices XCO.30695-704

• BEETHOVEN Quartet No. 14 in C sharp minor, Op.131
  Recorded 2 March 1936, Abbey Road Studio 3
  Cat. Nos. HMV DB.2810-14
  Matrices 2EA.3120-29

• BEETHOVEN Quartet No. 15 in A minor, Op.132
  Recorded 7 October 1937, Abbey Road Studio 3
  Cat. Nos. HMV DB.3375-3380s
  Matrices 2EA.5464-68/71-76

• BEETHOVEN Quartet No. 16 in F major, Op.135
  Recorded 13 November 1933, Abbey Road Studio 3
  Cat. Nos. HMV DB.2113-16
  Matrices 2B.5436-43

The Busch String Quartet:

Adolf Busch violin
Gösta Andreasson violin
Karl Doktor viola
Hermann Busch cello

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ARTICLE: « The Busch Quartet » (excerpt)

Only the Busch ensemble, in my experience, have
presented the Beethoven quartets on record in their full majesty – and
daring. Among the qualities that made Adolf Busch a great violinist were
his uniquely long bow strokes, controlled with profound intensity and
invested with a strong spiritual charge. Believing that the late
quartets had to be taken to extremes, he played fast movements very fast
– often up to Beethoven’s controversial markings – and slow movements
very slowly. With a rhythmic sense as rigorous in broad tempi as it was
exhilarating in quick tempi, he inspired his colleagues to match him in
exceptional feats of concentration. Acting as his own producer, with a
trusted HMV engineer such as ‘Chick’ Fowler, he generally made just one
take of each side in a slow movement, so as to keep the intensity going
from take to take. The luminous beauty of the Busch Quartet’s playing
can snatch your breath away in any of their repertoire, but the
uninitiated should start with late Beethoven.

Tully Potter, Gramophone, November 2013

REVIEW 1976 LP reissue

Before the war the Busch Quartet played Beethoven better than any
other ensemble, and they still sound marvellous. They were always at
their best in the late quartets and with the arrival of these two discs
their newly transferred performances of all but the Grosse Fuge are now
available. The playing seems more spacious than that of the best modern
ensembles; they uncover the musical thought at their leisure. This
impression results in part from the very slow tempo in the stow
movements, but they can also sound almost leisured even when, according
to my watch, the tempo is normal, as in the Scherzo of the F major. I
think this is because they seem less prone than modern ensembles to push
their own technical accomplishments. Everything is subservient to the
music. The slow movement of the E flat is most beautifully done; quaver
lengths hardly vary in spite of all Beethoven’s changes of tempo, but if
the tempo is slow enough at the start they don’t need to. The slow
movement of the C sharp minor is so thoughtfully played that the Quartet
as a whole takes three or four minutes longer than usual, and very
moving it sounds. In the very difficult Scherzo that follows the rhythm
is uneven in places; here alone complete success eludes the players.

Though the Busch Quartet scooped much less than most ensembles of the
1930s the 1976 listener will certainly notice such scoops as there are.
The trick is applied with curious inconsistency. For instance in the
first allegro theme of the E flat Busch himself sometimes slides up from
the first crotchet to the second (as in the first bar) and sometimes
doesn’t (as when the same phrase is repeated four bars later); when this
phrase is developed by all four players there is similar inconsistency.
It must follow that during rehearsals there was never any discussion
between the players as to whether they should scoop or not; it was just
left to chance like a touch of eighteenth-century improvisation. I do
not myself find the trick in any way worrying. Indeed in the first
movement of the E flat one can even persuade oneself that it adds a
touch of emotion to the sound. The illusion of leisured thinking is here
at its very best; the last page seems to me the very perfection of
playing. Here and elsewhere pianissimos are a constant wonder.

Bearing in mind that all this music was recorded forty years ago and
more, the quality is splendid; furthermore these excellent performances
of superb music are very reasonably priced. Strongly recommended.

R.F., Gramophone, November 1976, review of LP reissue on World Records

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