Morton Feldman: Violin and String Quartet

With a running time of just over two hours, Morton Feldman's 1985 composition "Violin and String Quartet" is one of his longer ones, even though it falls far short of such pieces as 1984's "For Philip Guston" at four hours or 1983's "String Quartet (II)" at over six hours without a break. Their durations have made it difficult to neatly fit such compositions onto CDs; the Ives Ensemble's 4-CD recording of String Quartet (II) (hat[now] ART, 2003) bore the message, "The track points are provided for convenience only and are not indications of divisions in the work."

The Another Timbre (AT) approach is different, "The break between the two discs of this double CD is made at a short pause at the end of page 24. If you bought this album but want to listen to Violin and String Quartet without a break, we'll send you a FLAC file of the complete piece." Problem solved. As an alternative, AT suggests that listening in two sittings of about an hour each works well...

Moving on to the music itself, this album's 129 minutes were recorded by Simon Reynell at The Old School, Starston, Norfolk, in September 2022. The five strings players were all from Apartment House (no surprise there for regular AT listeners) with the three violins, viola and cello combining beautifully and being perfectly captured by Reynell.

Near the time he wrote this piece, Feldman said that quiet sounds were the ones which interested him, a statement borne out by his compositions of the time. In common with his other compositions of the period, the music here is fairly quiet and tranquil throughout. There are sections of it which could initially give the impression that the same passage is being played over and over repeatedly. However, with further listening and/or attention to detail, it becomes apparent that there are subtle differences between these repetitions so that the music never sounds like a stuck LP. Overall, the composition makes enthralling listening, handsomely repaying those listeners who give it most attention but also entertaining any who choose to regard it as background music.