On another trip to the library I got, among other things, some more
Mozart quartets, this time by the Salomon Quartet.  This group has been
highly praised by a number of list members.  Listening to parts of the G
major quartet K387 that I so enjoyed last week as played by the Quatuor
Mosaiques, I can only ask:  how can this possibly be? Where the QM had a
bounce and swing to their rhythm, life and allure in their phrasing, and
a beautiful sound, the SQ in the same repertoire weakens the contrasts,
makes the melodies sound trite and predictable, and manages to sound
simultaneously flaccid and inflexibly square in its rhythm.  And at least
one of the players has a buzzing and acidic timbre which annoys me.  And
the whole sorry affair is recorded in the acoustic of Chartres Cathedral.
Could it be that Bob Draper got to know his Mozart from this disc? To be
fair, the date on the cover is 1991 - that's almost a decade ago.  And
they may be better in Haydn.

The QM, on the other hand, of whom I got some Haydn Quartets, are rising
daily in my esteem.  If everyone played like this and, going one step
further, dropped the HIP pretensions to authenticity, I'm convinced the
use of modern string instruments would die out overnight (and if I'm not
mistaken, in Germany the use of steel strings and continuous vibrato only
gained full currency as late as the 1920's).

I've also listened again to the Grumiaux trio recordings of the Quintets
that I praised to the nines to Bob Draper some time ago - unfortunately
they now sound somewhat too velvety and patrician to me.  I feel I've
already caught the HIP bug.

Felix Delbruck
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