Quatuor Ebène

“This is a genre made particularly famous by Beethoven, so that anyone who is not Beethoven is scared stiff of it,” wrote Gabriel Fauré of the string quartet. Fauré’s String Quartet in E Minor—his final work—borrows from an unfinished youthful violin concerto and fearlessly explores new thematic and harmonic territory. Beethoven’s String Quartet in G Major honors the Classical style with its elegance and ebullient spirit, while Bartók’s work derives energy from a pair of driving scherzos: one quiet and terrifying, the other playful, weaving a mysterious spell with its slow movement’s impressionist tone.