Within a short time after its formation in 1992, the Rubin Quartet quickly emerged as a potent contender among Europe’s young chamber ensembles. These four players execute the demanding textural effects and gnarly motivic strands of Bartók’s Fourth Quartet with commanding assurance and dynamic thrust. They characterize the second movement’s spooky, whirling dervish sensibility to perfection, and bring out the songful implications underneath the pizzicato movement’s prickly surface. The Allegro molto, however, sounds slightly hard-driven and monochrome compared with the almost offhanded, speech-like interaction I treasure in the Vegh Quartet’s classic recording (Astrée Valois).
The Rubin Quartet’s emphatic articulation and massive sonority in Sofia Gubaidulina’s stark, quasi-minimal Second Quartet contrasts to the sleeker, more transparent Danish Quartet rendition (CPO). Both are equally convincing. Stravinsky’s Three Pieces sound as folksy and sophisticated as they ought. While the world isn’t exactly panting for another version of Shostakovich’s most recorded quartet, the Rubins’ traversal of the Eighth is among the most gripping, fluid, dramatically perceptive, and technically thrilling I’ve heard, matching the Emerson’s hair-trigger ensemble values while dispatching the central Allegretto with more litheness. In sum, an excellently performed, engineered, and annotated sampling of 20th century quartet pillars–top line music making at a bargain basement price. Go for it. [3/13/2001]
