The Quebec string quartets that lead a sustained career can be counted on the fingers of one hand. The Molinari and Bozzini quartets (contemporary music), the Nouveau Quatuor Orford, the Quatuor Arthur-Leblanc and the Quatuor Saguenay are those that come immediately to mind.
Posted at 4:00 p.m.
The Saguenay Quartet is one of the most prolific with some fifteen recordings to its credit. Founded 33 years ago, the former Alcan Quartet is made up of the solo strings of the Orchester symphonique du Saguenay–Lac-Saint-Jean.
This first disc since Rio Tinto Alcan, their lifelong patron, decided to withdraw its marbles in 2016, but also since the young violinist Marie Bégin joined the original nucleus as first violin four years ago, was produced in the magnificent acoustics of the Domaine Forget last winter with the ATMA team.
The program, ideally matched, takes up two milestones in the ensemble’s concert repertoire, namely the Quartet in E minoropus 44, noh 2, by Mendelssohn, and the Quartet by Ravel, in addition to a contemporary piece with popular sounds by the Italian Giovanni Sollima, Federico IIresulting from its cycle Viaggio in Italy.
The playing of the whole is precise, matured, engaged. The musicians do not hesitate to “bite” into the rope in the more lively passages of the finales of each of the scores as well as in the second movement of the Ravel, where the indication “very rhythmic” is taken seriously with energetic pizzicatos which transform the group into a gigantic guitar.
We are obviously not at the level of the best quartets on the planet like the Emersons, the Ebènes or the Dovers. There would be room for more urgency in the first two movements of Mendelssohn, and for more diversity in colors, more singularization of atmospheres in the slow movement of Ravel. But overall, this is a very successful first opus for this new version of the Saguenay Quartet.
Classic
Mendelssohn, Ravel and Sollima
Saguenay Quartet
ATMA Classic