poster for 2013 From Bach Disc 7
× The string quartet medium, the spinal column of the chamber music literature, did not exist in Bach’s lifetime. Yet even here, Bach’s legacy is inescapable. The fugues of his seminal The Well-Tempered Clavier inspired no less a genius than Mozart, who arranged them for string quartet. Bach’s architectural mastery permeates the ingenious Quinten Quartet of Joseph Haydn, the father of the modern string quartet. Disc VII concludes with Beethoven’s Opus 132 Quartet, recalling another Bachian signature: the Baroque master’s sacred chorales.