Shostakovich: String Quartets Nos. 2, 7 & 10 (SACD)

The 15 string quartets that Dmitri Shostakovich composed established him as a master of the genre. These works show him at his most concentrated and intimate. Although each is quite different in form and structure, each bar reveals an aspect of the composer's character, from wild humor to black despair, with an all-pervading nervous tension. Without texts, descriptive titles or an obvious public agenda, they can be heard as revelations of the composer's musicality at its most basic. The Jerusalem Quartet presents three of Shostakovich's quartets on their first release on BIS Records. Although the String Quartet No. 2 was composed in 1944, its character is elusive and there is no direct reference to the war. Nevertheless, it is a substantial work, dark, powerful and sometimes dissonant. The 7th String Quartet, consisting of three short movements played without interruption, is an enigmatic and deeply personal work dedicated to the memory of the composer's wife. For all its questions and complex internal references, String Quartet No. 10 is one of the most immediately appealing of his later works. At this stage in his life, Shostakovich tended to speak in a softer voice and for a more intimate audience.