Australian Haydn Ensemble - Love & Devotion: String Quartets by Haydn, Mozart & Mendelssohn

The AHE has lift off with a program of three immensely satisfying quartets. All have moments of such emotional intensity that they seem to come from a place of deep personal feeling. So is love in the air? The D major is one of Haydn’s most enjoyable quartets. So expressive is the second movement that an early biographer placed it in a sequence of works stemming from an “acute emotional crisis”. He even filled the evidence gap with the death of an invented lover. Mozart’s D minor quartet dates from a blissful period of his life just post his marriage to Constanze, but if it’s infused with love, it’s as much for his new friend and father figure, Haydn, as it is for his bride. 18-year-old Mendelssohn dedicated his Opus 12 quartet literally to the girl-next-door, one Betty Pistor, but she responded by dumping him. The legacy of this doomed affair is a great, glorious, mature work as rich as romantic opera; brimming with melody and rule-smashing invention.

AHE String Quartet

Skye McIntosh, violin

Alice Evans, violin

Karina Schmitz, viola

Daniel Yeadon, cello

For more information see AHE website: https://www.australianhaydn.com.au/