Reviews

The Wihan Quartet have held their position of eminence among the most distinguished Czech chamber groups for nearly 40 years. This remarkable consistency, in part a result of minimal personnel […]

Bohemian Rhapsody Freddie Mercury was teamed up with Montserrat Caballe, and it worked! Why? Because both of those performers, one from the ‘pop’ genre and the other ‘high’ opera, hit […]

…The Wihan Quartet opened with the String Quartet no. 2, composed in 1925, when Martinů was a young man living in Paris and absorbing new musical influences like jazz… “The opening […]

Mozart himself made these chamber adaptations of the first three piano concertos he composed soon after settling in Vienna in 1781 as a freelance composer-pianist. In each of them, the combination of an […]

…The Wihan Quartet seemed to enjoy the freedom of Wolf’s episodic structure, capturing the Serenade’s light-hearted, often ironic, spirit.  The opening was feathery and refined – lots of air between bow […]

“The Wihan Quartet has secured a reputation as one of the world’s finest chamber ensembles.” Notwithstanding two changes in personnel in recent years, they have maintained their high standing… …The […]

Picture this: one of the Peak District’s most beautiful valleys; a perfect, pale-blue evening in mid-summer; an ancient churchyard thronged with a relaxed crowd admiring the view, or wending their […]

… Leoš Čepický sits ram-rod straight with an air of assurance and subtle wit, his tone incisively etched, and second fiddler Jan Schulmeister leans into and over his instrument, tactilely […]

… Beethoven’s Cavatina is highly charged with emotion – Beethoven himself was reportedly moved to tears by its beauty and profundity – and the Wihan employed a wide, prominent vibrato, creating and […]

The Wihan Quartet is one of the most experienced and admired of chamber ensembles. The present recording offers three classics from the Czech repertoire and also furnishes evidence of the […]

“Right from the off in Dvořák’s late G major Quartet you can tell that the Wihan Quartet are taking an inflected route… the Wihan play sensitively and their fill-ups are […]

“… On this occasion at King’s Place the Wihan performed quartets from the Classical and early Romantic eras, demonstrating the remarkable, unassuming empathy which exists between the four players…” We […]

…This unassuming anthology is revelatory… a thoroughbred Prague-based string quartet playing 13 Beatles songs, in superb, sophisticated arrangements by the eclectic Czech composer Luboš Krtička… “That these players approach Krtička’s […]

… A hushed section arrives for solo violin, high in its register, answered by the rest of the quartet before the music [of Elie Wiesel (A Portrait)] continues, full of […]

“Everything about this recording suggests long acquaintance and a great deal of thought.” The great G major Quartet has a dramatic, operatic intensity to it, a sense of powerful narrative […]

Schubert remains one of the most elusive of pre-Romantic composers, not least in his mature string quartets. Emphasise the Classicist side of his nature and you risk underplaying the music’s […]