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The magnificent Végh Quartet on home territory Joint remastering by Dr John Duffy & Andrew Rose
Notes on the restoration: This recording was originally presented to Pristine Classical by Dr. John Duffy for inclusion in our PADA Exclusives streamed audio service playlist. A fine recording, it had won great plaudits upon its release in 1954, and was double-starred in the 1955 issue of The Record Guide, their highest accolade. However, time moves on, and I felt that the original sound was perhaps somewhat veiled and might benefit from a little XR remastering. I quickly put together a rough remastering and sent this across the Internet to Dr. Duffy. The title of his response - "Revelation" - says it all, and I decided this recording really merited a full release. Taking Dr. Duffy's transfer as my source, I then proceeded to produce a full XR Ambient Stereo master. This proved more time-consuming than I had expected - not only did the high-precision re-equalisation lift a veil from the performers, it also exposed the inevitable weaknesses in the medium - mid-50's vinyl, which then required further restoration over and above that which Dr. Duffy had already so expertly dealt with. The result, I feel, is a triumph - both musically and in performance - and also as a joint restoration effort. Decca's reputation for high quality recordings was rightly lauded, and this is an excellent example of that. Very highly recommended recordings of some little-known but excellent chamber music.
Sándor Végh and the Végh Quartet The Végh Quartet was a Hungarian string quartet founded in 1940 and led by its first violinist Sándor Végh for 40 years. The quartet was based in Budapest until it departed Hungary in 1946. They are particularly known for their recordings of Beethoven (recorded twice - 1952 mono and 1972-4 stereo) and Bartók cycles. Sándor Végh (Kolozsvár, [at the time called Klausenburg and part of the Hungarian Kingdom, now called Cluj-Napoca and part of Romania] 17 May 1912 – Salzburg, 7 January 1997), Hungarian violinist and conductor. He was best known as one of the great chamber music violinists of the twentieth century, He began studying the piano at the age of six. He entered the Budapest Conservatory in 1924, taking violin studies with Jenő Hubay and composition with Zoltán Kodály. He began a career as a solo violinist and in 1927 played a Richard Strauss composition under the composer’s baton. He graduated from the Conservatory in 1930, having won the Hubay Prize and the Reményi Prize from the institution in 1927. As his solo career was developing, he joined the Hungarian Trio with Ilonka Krauss and László Vencze. In 1934 he became one of the founding members of the Hungarian String Quartet. He was initially the first violin, but gave that position to Zoltán Székely and took second chair. He participated with the Hungarian String Quartet in the first performance of Béla Bartók’s String Quartet no. 5. Végh left the Hungarian Quartet in 1940 to found his own quartet, the Végh Quartet. During the same season he became a professor at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest. He and the quartet left Hungary in 1946. The quartet continued to give concerts until the mid-1970s; Végh also made solo appearances as a violinist. He took French citizenship in 1953. In 1962 he met cellist Pablo Casals, who invited Végh to join him in giving summer classes in Zermatt, Switzerland (1953-62), and to appear annually in Casals’ Prades Festival (1953-69). He found teaching rewarding, and thereafter taught in Basle Conservatory (1953-63), Freiburg (1954-62), Düsseldorf (1962-69) and the Mozarteum in Salzburg (1971-97). He founded the International Chamber Music Festival of Cervo in 1962 and often conducted there. He founded the Sándor Végh Chamber Orchestra and conducted it for a term lasting from 1968 to 1971, and conducted the Marlboro Festival Orchestra (1974-77). In 1979 he became conductor of the Camerata Academica at the Mozarteum. With them he made a recording of Mozart’s divertimentos and serenades that won the Grand Prix du Disque in 1989. He was awarded “Chevalier de la Legion d’Honneur” in 1986, Doctor Honoris causa of the Warwick and Exeter universities (1987), an honorary appointment as Commander of the British Empire (CBE) in 1988 and the gold medal of Salzburg in 1987. After a short illness, he died at a hospital in Freilassing, just across the border from Salzburg.
Notes from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sándor_Végh
Zoltán Kodály
Zoltán Kodály (December 16, 1882 – March 6, 1967) was a Hungarian composer, ethnomusicologist, educator, linguist, and philosopher. Born in Kecskemét, Kodály spent most of his childhood in Galanta and Nagyszombat (now Trnava, Slovakia). His father was a stationmaster and keen amateur musician, and Kodály learned to play the violin as a child. He also sang in a cathedral choir and wrote music, despite having little formal musical education. In 1900, Kodály entered the University of Budapest to study modern languages, and began to study music at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest, where Hans Koessler taught him composition. One of the first people to undertake the serious study of folk tales, Kodály became one of the most significant early figures in the field of ethnomusicology. From 1905 he visited remote villages to collect songs recording them on phonograph cylinders. In 1906 he wrote the thesis on Hungarian folk song ("Strophic Construction in Hungarian Folksong"). Around this time Kodály met fellow composer Béla Bartók, whom he took under his wing and introduced to some of the methods involved in folk song collecting. The two became lifelong friends and champions of each other's music. After gaining his PhD in philosophy and linguistics, Kodály went to Paris where he studied with Charles Widor. There he discovered and absorbed various influences, notably the music of Claude Debussy. In 1907 he moved back to Budapest and gained a professorship at the Academy of Music there. He continued his folk music-collecting expeditions through World War I without interruption. Kodály had composed throughout this time, producing two String quartets (op.2, 1909 and op.10, 1917 respectively), Sonata for cello and piano (op.4, 1910) and Sonata for cello solo (Op. 8, 1915),[1] and his Duo for violin and cello (op.7, 1914). All these works show a great originality of form and content, a very interesting blend of highly sophisticated mastery in the Western-European style of music, including classical, late-romantic, impressionistic and modernist tradition and at the other hand profound knowledge and respect for the folk music on Hungary, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Albania and other Eastern-European countries. Due to the outbreak of the First World War and subsequent major geopolitical changes in the region and partly because of the personal shyness Kodály had no major public success until 1923 when his Psalmus Hungaricus premiered at a concert to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the union of Buda and Pest (Bartók's Dance Suite premiered on the same occasion.) Following this success, Kodály travelled throughout Europe to conduct his music. Kodály was very interested in the problems of music education, and wrote a large amount of material on music education methods as well as composing a large amount of music for children. Beginning in 1935, along with colleague Jenö Ádám, he embarked on a long term project to reform music teaching in the lower and middle schools. His work resulted in the publication of several highly influential books and he had a profound impact on musical education both inside and outside his home country. Some commentators refer to his ideas as the "Kodály Method", although this seems something of a misnomer, as he did not actually work out a comprehensive method, rather laying down a set of principles to follow in music education. See also: Kodály Hand Signs. He continued to compose for professional ensembles also, with the Dances of Marosszék (1930, in versions for solo piano and for full orchestra), the Dances of Galanta (1933, for orchestra), the Peacock Variations (1939, commissioned by the Concertgebouw Orchestra to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary) and the Missa Brevis (1944, for soloists, chorus, orchestra and organ) among his better known works. The suite from his opera Háry János (1926) also became well known, though few productions of the opera itself take place. It was first performed in Budapest and conductors such as Toscanini, Mengelberg and Furtwangler have included this piece in their repertoires. Kodály remained in Budapest through World War II, retiring from teaching in 1942. In 1945 he became the president of the Hungarian Arts Council, and in 1962 received the Order of the Hungarian People's Republic. His other posts included a presidency of the International Folk Music Council, and honorary presidency of the International Society for Music Education. He died in Budapest in 1967, one of the most respected and well known figures in the Hungarian arts. In 1966, the year before Kodály's death, the Kodály Quartet, a string quartet named in Kodály's honour, formed. His notable students include John Verrall.
Notes from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoltán_Kodály
Bedřich Smetana
Bedřich Smetana (2 March 1824 - 12 May 1884) was a Czech composer, one of the most significant that his country has ever hosted. He is best known for his symphonic poem Vltava (also known as The Moldau from the German), the second in a cycle of six which he entitled Má vlast ("My Country"), and for his opera The Bartered Bride. Smetana was the son of a brewer in Litomyšl in Bohemia, then part of the Austrian Empire. He studied piano and violin from an early age, and played in an amateur string quartet with other members of his family. Smetana attended a high school in Pilsen from 1840-1843. He studied music in Prague, despite initial resistance from his father. He secured a post as music master to a noble family, and in 1848 received funds from Franz Liszt to establish his own music school. September 1855 marked the death of his second child, his beloved four-year-old daughter Bedřiška. When his third child died nine months later, he committed himself to composition, producing the Piano Trio in G minor. This piece is full of sadness and despair, making use of phrases that are cut short, possibly in resemblance to his daughter's own life. Smetana moved in 1856 to Gothenburg, Sweden, where he taught, conducted, and gave chamber music recitals. In 1863, back in Prague, he opened a new school of music dedicated to promoting specifically Czech music. By 1874 he had become almost totally deaf, but he continued to compose; Má vlast was written after his deafness had developed. He also suffered from tinnitus which caused him to hear a continuous, maddening high note which he described as the "shrill whistle of a first inversion chord of A-flat in the highest register of the piccolo." From 1875 he lived mostly in the small village of Jabkenice. His string quartet in E minor, Z mého života (From My Life, composed in 1876), the first of two pieces that he wrote for the medium, is an autobiographical work. Each movement deals with a different aspect of its creator's life. The first movement is expressive, demonstrative of Smetana's youthful love of art and his search for something undefinable. The second movement, carefree and somewhat raucous, takes the listener back to the days of Smetana's youth. The third movement is reminiscent of the happiness Smetana felt when in love with the girl who later became his wife. The final movement begins with Smetana's joy over the recognition which was given to the national music of Bohemia. However, as the movement progresses, the music is punctuated by a piercing high E in the first violin which, Smetana explained, represents the devastating effects of his tinnitus. He may also be hinting at this personal misfortune with the piccolo scoring in Má vlast. Smetana was the first composer to write music that was specifically Czech in character. Many of his operas are based on Czech themes and myths, the best known being the comedy The Bartered Bride (1866). He used many Czech dance rhythms and his melodies sometimes resemble folk songs, though he was proud of not directly quoting folktunes for the most part. Smetana maintained that his country's music should be a patriotic expression of the Czech life and collective soul. In this assumption, he clashed with a former friend of his, Frantisek Pivoda, who believed that "art knows no boundaries." Pivoda wanted to see fair interchange of artistic ideas between countries. In 1882 Smetana suffered further effects of his progressive neurological illness. After he suffered a stroke-like seizure, doctors forbade him to compose in the fear that the increased mental activity of composition would result in further seizures. However, Smetana rebelled against these orders and composed his final, incomplete, opera, Viola. In 1884 he was taken to the Prague Lunatic Asylum, where he died soon afterwards. He is interred in the Vyšehrad cemetery in Prague. For many years it was believed that Smetana suffered from syphilis. Nevertheless, later studies carried out by Dr Jiří Ramba, who studied Smetana's skull, revealed that he suffered from osteomyelitis. Smetana was a great influence on Antonín Dvořák, who similarly used Czech themes in his works. The output of Smetana influenced many Czech composers who came after him, and continues to inspire musicians today.
Notes from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smetana
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