Kosmos Kammermusik: Quatuor Ébène

Beethoven composed 16 String Quartets over approximately a quarter century, further developing the genre from the succession of Haydn to works reaching far into the future. In Beethoven's Year 2027, both Belcea Quartet and Quatuor Ébène will perform all Quartets – not chronologically ordered, but so that different creative phases stand side by side. In this concert, Quatuor Ébène presents String Quartet No. 1 from the early collection op. 18 – and contrasts it with two of its most famous Quartets: The 'Harp Quartet', named for the pizzicati in the first movement, and the 'Rasumowsky-Quartet' No. 3, named after its dedicatee, in which Beethoven showcased his compositional skills in quasi-Russian folk style and a nearly caricatured Menuett.