Sunday, October 27, 2013

Hindemith by the Guilet Quartet

Yes, another LP, but this time one that's taken from 78-rpm originals.  Truth to tell, I wish I had those 78 originals, because there's at least one side join in Concert Hall's c. 1950 transfer that I know I could have done a better job with, simply because I have technology that wasn't available to the good folks at Concert Hall Society back then.  But I suspect this LP is easier to come by than the 78s, simply because the 78s were part of a subscription package whereby the subscriber had to buy all the releases for a given year (and besides that, they were expensive, and a limited edition to boot), whereas the LP was a general release that remained in the catalog until 1957.  So here it is, this first (and, I believe, the only pre-digital) recording of this early Hindemith quartet:

Hindemith: Quartet No. 4 [new No. 5], Op. 32
Guilet String Quartet (Guilet-Gorodetzky-Brieff-Laporte)
Recorded c. 1947
Concert Hall CHS-1086, one ten-inch LP record
Link (FLAC files, 56.72 MB)
Link (MP3 files, 41.38 MB)

In this post I had some tart comments about the confusing issue of the numbering of Hindemith's quartets.

2 comments:

  1. thank you, Bryan, for this little wonder.
    AFAIK the initiative (and responsibility) in re-numbering Hindemith's quartets lies completely on Schott Verlag managing board.
    i didn't understand why have they done it. Hindemith's quartets share the same situation as those by Schoenberg. 1 early without number and the rest with the composer's numbering. why not to leave them intact, in order to avoid misunderstandings?
    i remember well, how impatiently was i waiting for the release of Hindemit's quartets by Wergo (Schott affiliation) in the rendition of JSQ with now retired (and then present!) Robert Mann.
    just after receiving the first disc with the 3rd and 5th quartets, I've rushed to listen to them. and what was my disappointment when, instead of my favorite pieces i've heard other works. namely the 2nd and 4th quartets.

    br-r-r-r-rrr...

    ReplyDelete
  2. Great! Thanks for this interesting LP, Bryan!

    ReplyDelete