Gramophone Awards
2024
Shortlisted - Chamber

Presto Recording of the Week
8th September 2023

Gramophone Magazine
October 2023
Editor's Choice

Barbara Hannigan (soprano), Bertrand Chamayou (piano)
Emerson String Quartet

Hindemith: Melancholie, Op. 13
Berg: String Quartet, Op. 3
Chausson: Chanson perpétuelle, Op. 37
Schoenberg: String Quartet No. 2 in F sharp minor, Op. 10

The title of this album evokes not only the life-long journey of all these musicians, but also a lasting friendship between soprano Barbara Hannigan and the Emerson String Quartet. One of the greatest string quartets of the last four decades, the Emersons will disband in October 2023. Barbara and the Emersons were determined to record Schoenberg's Quartet No. 2 since they started performing the work together in 2015. "The sheer sonic scope of this work takes us on a voyage into previously uncharted territory" say the Emerson musicians. "It's like a tall, gnarly tree to climb (all the way to another planet, it seems), yet one with deep and emotional roots", continues Barbara Hannigan. "The soprano’s fin-de- siècle primal scream at the end of the 3rd movement, begging to be relieved of love, is a heavy hitter". Melancholie is a rare and intimate work by the young Hindemith, "a gem of a piece" that the Canadian soprano has wanted to explore for many years. The fascinating Quartet Op. 3, composed by Berg in 1909 as he was finishing his apprenticeship with Schoenberg, features the quartet on its own. And to round out the album, pianist Bertrand Chamayou joins Barbara and the Emersons for another deeply moving encounter by way of Chausson's heartbreaking Chanson perpétuelle.