Although the Beethoven string quartets are generously represented on CD and there is even a version of the transcription of the Op. 14 No. 1 Sonata to be found, you will look in vain for the C major Quintet, Yet it is a rewarding and remarkable score, written only a year before the First Symphony. Given the explosive growth of CD it is amazing that it has received so little attention. ''No earlier Beethoven work has such a broad, even majestic opening as the quintet'' wrote Basil Lam in his fine study of the Beethoven quartets (London: 1975): Schubert must have known it well since there are overtones or anticipations of the B flat Sonata D960, and the G major Quartet D887. The Presio finale earned the Quintet the nickname Der Sturm at one time, doubtless on account of the anticipation of the storm in the Pastoral Symphony. Unlike Schubert's C major Quintet, it has the second viola as do Michael Haydn's and Mozart's, and those of Beethoven's contemporary E. A. Foerster, whose essays in the medium deserve investigation.
The Medici Quartet with Simon Rowland-Jones as second violist give us an eminently faithful and musical reading, free from any egocentric posturing. I warm to their natural, unaffected approach as I did to their recent Nimbus set of the first three of Beethoven's Op. 18 Quartets ((CD) NI5173, 8/89): tempos are sensible and the performance has all the spontaneity of live music-making with plenty of risks taken. Nothing is glamorized, yet there is no lack of polish. One is spared the exaggerated sforzandos and rapt piano-pianissimos of jet-setting quartets. The ensemble is well balanced, though I was occasionally conscious of a certain want of projection from the cellist in the outer movements. Incidentally, all repeats are observed.
In the First Rasumovsky Quartet competition is nothing if not keen and if you were wanting this record primarily for the Quartet, I would urge you to hear it before making up your mind. Again, it is well played and there are some felicitous touches of phrasing and colour. However, the Medici's first movement is just too fast for my taste, though to be fair, they are not as fast as the Alban Berg (EMI). Indeed, once one has adjusted to their viewpoint, they succeed in sounding flowing rather than hurried. But I could not reconcile myself to the slow movement, which in their hands is just too flowing. The Lindsay (ASV) take their time (they are about two and a half minutes longer) and in so doing colour their phases with greater subtlety and convey infinitely more depth of feeling. Theirs is an eloquence that has the power to make time stand still. As in the String Quintet, Anthony Lewis could at times be less reticent.
The recording, made in The Maltings, Snape, has both presence and bloom. I would recommend this performance of the Quintet, which alone is worth the price of the record.'