The aggressively snatched opening challenge of the Schumann Quintet made me fear the worst. But though the tempo for this first movement is too brisk for phrasing of the most personally affectionate kind, there is compensation in the players' unflagging impulse. Throughout the work, they present a Schumann at the height of his powers as a craftsman, exuberantly sustaining longer arguments without visible seams or effort of any kind. Even in the ensuing quasi funeral march they leave you in no doubt of Schumann's choice of an alla breve time-signature: episodes bring potent contrast from the tersely articulated, sombre main theme. The Scherzo is athletic: here I would have preferred a nimbler, more fanciful touch. But the players' elan in the finale is invigorating.
Though Schumann entrusts a load of responsibility to the keyboard, I was not often worried by the balance in this work. However, in Brahms's Quintet, with its fuller chordal textures, I felt rather like a page-turner sitting by the pianist's left hand. Time and time again the piano seems too closely recorded, at the expense of the strings (not forgetting the leader's silken Guarnerius). And in the reverberant Schloss Grafenegg riding school in Austria its bass sounds plummy, its tone in general insufficiently clearly and sharply focused. Engineers and players alike risk a very wide dynamic range, sometimes, surely, carrying contrasts to extremes, as in the pp and ff of the Scherzo. Nor is this the only movement where in louder and more excitable contexts they are tempted to force the issue, sacrificing both tonal and musical refinement. While appreciating their immediacy of reaction, I found the interpretation as a whole lacking in true Brahmsian mellowness and incandescence. At top price, I would recommend collectors to stick to old favourites.'