QT STR [Audio CD] Verdi, G.

The Verdi Quartet returns to perform the music of their namesake! Following their critically acclaimed cycle of the complete Schubert String Quartets, the Verdis head for sunny Italy in a remarkably well rounded program of works. Written during his “down-time” during rehearsals for the premiere of Aida, Verdi’s String Quartet has suffered undue neglect, not the least of which was a result of the composer’s own overly harsh assessment. Reservations or not, Verdi’s late String Quartet is a fine score, that prefigures the composition of his late masterwork, Falstaff. Another autumnal string quartet is Benjamin Britten’s String Quartet No. 3, op. 94. Composed shortly after completing his final opera, “Death in Venice”, Britten’s quartet exhibits a delicate melancholy and world-weariness, finely wrought and stunningly played by the Verdis. Rounding out the program, and tying it all together is a Thomas Rabenschlag’s delightful Paraphrase on Themes from Verdi’s “Aida”.