{"product_id":"britten-string-quartets-nos-1-3-3-divertimenti-purcell","title":"Britten: String Quartets Nos. 1-3 - 3 Divertimenti - Purcell","description":"\u003cimg src=\"\/graphics\/features\/gramophone_choice.jpg\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e  Founded in 1998 at Pro Corda, Suffolk, the multi-award-winning Doric String Quartet describes recording Britten’s quartets as a significant milestone: ‘In our recording we have endeavoured to tread a line that brings out the humanity in these works but also recognises the need for distance and fragility. This is very personal and intimate music, yet also world-encompassing and timeless.’ The Quartet continues: ‘Another feature of this recording is that Hélène Clément, our violist, is playing on Benjamin Britten’s own viola. This instrument (on loan from the Britten-Pears Foundation) was made in 1843 in Milan by Francesco Guissani. It was previously owned by the composer Frank Bridge who gave it to Britten, as a departure gift when Britten and Pears set sail for the USA in 1939.’ Hélène Clément writes: ‘To be able to explore the music of Britten with the very sound that the composer had in his ears is the greatest honour and joy I could have imagined.’\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e  -----\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e  REVIEW:\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e  Britten's final work, the G major quartet, Op 94 (completed, with the help of Colin Matthews, shortly before his death in 1976), is a small but substantial contribution to the canon, comparable in its emotional intensity — certainly as played, electrifyingly, here by the Doric String Quartet - with Shostakovich’s 15 works.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e  – Sunday Times (UK)","brand":"Chandos","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":49704204042520,"sku":"095115212424","price":21.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0687\/4346\/3192\/files\/3905526.jpg?v=1747141431","url":"https:\/\/hbdirect.com\/products\/britten-string-quartets-nos-1-3-3-divertimenti-purcell","provider":"HBDirect","version":"1.0","type":"link"}