The Quartet Ysaÿe delivers to us a CD of very great quality, a new sonority and melody. This marvel gathers together the two works of Beethoven for string quintet, but also some unusual pieces for string quartet:

Quintets:

• Quintet for strings, opus 29;
• Fugue for string quintet, opus 137.

Quartets:

• Piece in B minor (not catalogued);
• Minuet, Hess 33;
• Prelude and Fugue, Hess 30;
• Arrangement of the Fugue of the Overture of Solomon of Handel, Hess 36;
• Arrangement of the sonata for piano opus 14 no. 1, Hess 34.

The Septet opus 20, in E flat major, was written around 1800, for violin, viola, clarinet, clarinet, horn, bassoon, cello and double bass. Beethoven considered this work to be 'popular' (once can imagine the grimace accompanying this remark). It was commercially very successful.

The Sextet opus 18b, also in E flat major, was composed in 1794, for two horns, two violins, viola and cello. This was lately published in Bonn. The two horns have a prominent place in the sextet.

Consortium Classicum
DMG - 1995

Berlin Classics - 1994

The Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie under the direction of Walter Levin presents two arrangements of works by Beethoven:

• The Septet in E flat major, opus 20;

• The Grand Fugue in B flat major, opus 133.

A different sound for well known works.

Arturo Toscanini led the NBC Symphony Orchestra on 18th November 1939.

This recording consists of the overture to Egmont and the Seventh Symphony, but also and adaptation of the septet for orchestra.

A classic sometimes forgotten and not easy to find.

Naxos - 1999

Naxos - 2003

"Metamorphosis Quintet" presents us with three works of Ludwig van Beethoven transcribed for string quintet.

The transcriptions are the work of Carl Khym, or Chym (1770-?), who realised and published them during Beethoven's lifetime:

• Trio for piano Opus 1 no. 2;

• Trio for clarinet Opus 11;

• Sonata for horn and piano, opus 17.
  

Berlin Classics - 1994

Here are two other works of Ludwig van Beethoven transcribed for string quintet by Ulf-Guido Schäfer:

• Sextet, opus 71;

• Octet, opus 103.

The Ma'alot Quintet perform these two works as well as two works by Usang Yun, also for string quintet.

Here, on this CD, is one of the two principal works composed by Beethoven giving the viola the principal part: the Notturno opus 42 for viola and piano.

Tabea Zimmermann playing, with a historical bow, the viola which Beethoven used at the Bonn court and which has been restored. Hartmut Höll plays on the Conrad Graf of 1824. Also on the CD, the Etudes no. 4 and 7 for viola and piano by Franz Anton Hoffmeister and the Sonata for piano and viola opus 5 no. 3 of Johann Nepomuk Hummel.

Ars Musici - 2003

"You who have ordered the Zimmermann/Höll recording can look forward to a treat! Their playing is absolutely marvellous, the tone quality of the viola is one of the most beautiful I have ever heard (and I have quite a lot of comparisons, having heard most of the world's great violas in the four double-CDs of "The recorded viola"), and the pianoforte is the 1824 Graf which also was one of Beethoven's and displayed in Beethovenhaus, Bonn.

Tabea Zimmermann's playing is delicate, I have tried to detect where she shifts positions, in order to learn some "tricks", but my efforts have been in vain. Just listen to her playing in the last movement's 2nd variation, what a fantastic tone! Such playing and such a tone make me ask: Why on earth has the viola always been in the shadow of the violin and the cello?

I have two critical remarks to the CD though. One is a small one: I wish the booklet had contained much more information on the two instruments. For instance, I would have liked to know what kind of strings the viola is equipped with, and it's size, its body length. (As you probably know, while violins have almost no variation in body length (ca. 35.5 cm), violas vary considerably, from the small ones at about 38 cm to the "giants" at about 45 cm. As far as I can remember, this viola looked quite small.) And I would like to know what a strange effect which is made by the Graf in the 4th movement, measure 9 and onwards! It sounds like a snare drum....

My other objection is to the arrangement as such. Who was this guy Franz Xaver Kleinheinz? He is only mentioned briefly twice in Thayer. I think the arrangement is lacking in inventiveness. Most of the time the viola plays the same line as it has in B's original String Trio version, the piano takes accordingly the violin and the cello. Only now and then is the viola allowed to play interesting cello sections, practically speaking never the violin's voice. But worse are the direct changes to Beethoven's own inventiveness: take for instance the 3rd movement Adagio, measure 55. Beethoven ingeniously wrote for the violin and viola the two beats in this way: four sixteenth-notes, then a triplet and four thirtysecond-notes, which gives a funny impression. Kleinheinz plainly writes eight sixteenth-notes, basta! Why did he "trivialize" (is that a word?) in that way? In the 4th movement Allegretto alla Polacca Beethoven wanted two full silences in measures 108 and 110. A splendid idea! However Kleinheinz could not resist the temptation to fill in something in those two measures. Why did he have to try to improve on Beethoven? We find even more strange deviations from the original in the last movement: after measure 115 Kleinheinz has inserted a measure, and in the concluding Tempo I he has removed measures 135-7!

Let me not forget to mention the other works on the CD: two of the fine twelve studies for viola solo by Franz Anton Hoffmeister, and a Sonata for viola and piano by Hummel, which was new to me. Everything is splendidly played, and the two instruments suit each other very well."

Finn Løvfold

This serenade for viola and cello, arranged by Beethoven as Notturno for piano and viola, opus 42, was transcribed for guitar by the Austrian composer and guitarist Wenzel Matiegka.

Guitar, flute, clarinette
Koch - 1998

Guitar, violin, viola
Coda - 1995

Guitar, viola, clarinette
Fleur de son - 2001

Under the name “Harp Concertos”, this CD also presents the only piece Beethoven composed for this instrument: the six Variations on a Swiss song, WoO 64, composed between 1790 – 1792.

Decca - London - 1990