If you like Mendelssohn’s Octet you will love this disc of Niels Gade’s chamber works. The Danish composer’s own Octet and Sextet are so similar in structure and sonority to the more famous work that you would swear they were written by Mendelssohn himself. Of course, Gade and Mendelssohn were reasonably close, as Gade was assistant conductor of the Gewandhaus Orchestra in Leipzig before taking over the directorship after Mendelssohn’s death in 1847. Composed in 1848, the Octet (not surprisingly) was inspired by Mendelssohn’s, with closely matched tempo markings across its four movements (including the same “con fuoco” direction in the first movement). The work does not enjoy the lyrical impulse of its predecessor but does feature its own delectable moments, especially in the light, plucky scherzo and the charming melodies in the violin in the finale.
The Sextet, completed in 1863 and later slightly revised, resembles Mendelssohn’s Octet even more: the scherzo, with its quicksilver repeated-note passages, sounds an awful lot like Mendelssohn’s first movement. The Berlin Philharmonic String Octet, whose stated mission is to expand the repertoire for string octet (a pretty narrow mandate, to be sure), plays with assuredness and with the same lustrous tone we associate with the Berlin orchestra itself. MDG’s sonics are excellent, featuring a full, rich acoustic without any undue heaviness in the lower strings.
