Just why Vagn Holmboe’s 20 numbered string quartets remain closer to the repertoire’s fringes rather than towards the center core is a mystery, for they teem with high craft and musical substance. The third volume in the Nightingale String Quartet’s Holmboe cycle may be a good starting point for listeners new to this very special composer. Quartet No. 5, composed in 1954 and 1955, from the first movement’s assertive accents and angular melodic trajectory to the Energico finale’s swirling trills and playful exploration of register extremes will surely delight chamber music fanciers.
Comparisons between the Nightingale Quartet and the Kontra Quartet (the ensemble featured in Dacapo’s earlier Holmboe Quartet cycle) are instructive. In the latter movement, the Nightingale’s emphatic gusto contrasts with the Kontra’s brisker and leaner approach. The Nightingale’s approach to the gripping Adagio is massive and emotive in tone, in contrast to the Kontra’s cooler homogenized blend. The Fourth Quartet’s Presto Espansivo features scurrying muted runs and quiet staccato strokes that Holmboe brilliantly yet individually appropriates from the Bartok playbook. Possibly because of the newer recording’s ample sonics, The Nightingale musicians evoke breadth and dynamism rather than the Kontra’s shimmer and mystery.
Both ensembles prove expressively comparable in Quartet No. 16’s relentless, close-lying counterpoint in the first movement and the ensemble ferocity they bring to the second movement Molto Vivace’s slashing chords. However, the seamless suavity characterizing the Kontra members’ interplay in the Finale’s perpetual motion passages yields to the Nightingale’s slightly slower yet contrapuntally clearer execution. Judging from this release and its two predecessors, I would wager that Nightingale cycle will ultimately complement rather than supersede the Kontra cycle. And that’s a good thing, because great music only benefits from having different yet equally valid interpretive vantage points available to collectors. Highly recommended.
