Hallgrimsson Chamber Works
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Haflidi Hallgrimsson
Label: Eye of the Storm
Magazine Review Date: 12/1996
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 142
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: EOS5004
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
(4) Movements: in memoriam Bryn Turley |
Haflidi Hallgrimsson, Composer
Haflidi Hallgrimsson, Composer Kreutzer Quartet |
Offerto: in memoriam Karl Kvaran |
Haflidi Hallgrimsson, Composer
Haflidi Hallgrimsson, Composer Peter Sheppard Skaerved, Violin |
Solitaire |
Haflidi Hallgrimsson, Composer
Haflidi Hallgrimsson, Composer Philip Sheppard, Cello |
String Quartet No. 1, 'From Memory' |
Haflidi Hallgrimsson, Composer
Haflidi Hallgrimsson, Composer Kreutzer Quartet |
Author: hfinch
In earlier incarnations, and before the commissions started rolling in, Haflidi Hallgrimsson, the Icelandic composer now resident in Edinburgh, was both a professional cellist and visual artist. This may well account for his fascination with the ‘hidden’ languages of the strings: his use of overtone cycles, his concentration of tone colours within an austerely limited palette, his constant and varied nuancing of bowstroke and articulation.
These qualities are revealed in meticulous and committed performances from the Kreutzer Quartet in a long-awaited recital of Hallgrimsson’s chamber music. It introduces the Four Movements for string quartet of 1990-91, a beautiful and moving memorial for the pianist Bryn Turley. A cello lament struggles to rise through reluctantly growing intervals, and tension increases as the dominating minor seconds and thirds collide against an intermittently plucking pulse. The second movement sees similarly enervated movement away from a single-note pivot, through polarized registers and textures. The third brings at last the raging of grief, still in tiny, irascible intervals, before a more melodically and harmonically lyrical finale, still troubled by trembling recollection.
Hallgrimsson’s First String Quartet of 1989 is more conventional of form, more overtly dramatic of gesture and technique. These two works, as challenging to the listener as to the players, are separated by the four evocatively named movements of the 1991 Offerto for solo violin, dedicated to the memory of Iceland’s great abstract artist, Karl Kvaran.
And on a second disc, the two string quartets appear again, but separated by Hallgrimsson’s early Solitaire, five testing and eloquent monologues for solo cello. These ‘alternative’ quartet performances, recorded within the same session, will yield new insights into the music for those who have ears, and are diligently prepared to hear.'
These qualities are revealed in meticulous and committed performances from the Kreutzer Quartet in a long-awaited recital of Hallgrimsson’s chamber music. It introduces the Four Movements for string quartet of 1990-91, a beautiful and moving memorial for the pianist Bryn Turley. A cello lament struggles to rise through reluctantly growing intervals, and tension increases as the dominating minor seconds and thirds collide against an intermittently plucking pulse. The second movement sees similarly enervated movement away from a single-note pivot, through polarized registers and textures. The third brings at last the raging of grief, still in tiny, irascible intervals, before a more melodically and harmonically lyrical finale, still troubled by trembling recollection.
Hallgrimsson’s First String Quartet of 1989 is more conventional of form, more overtly dramatic of gesture and technique. These two works, as challenging to the listener as to the players, are separated by the four evocatively named movements of the 1991 Offerto for solo violin, dedicated to the memory of Iceland’s great abstract artist, Karl Kvaran.
And on a second disc, the two string quartets appear again, but separated by Hallgrimsson’s early Solitaire, five testing and eloquent monologues for solo cello. These ‘alternative’ quartet performances, recorded within the same session, will yield new insights into the music for those who have ears, and are diligently prepared to hear.'
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