Schubertâ??s composition of a new string quartet begun in December 1820 was alas never to get beyond the first movement the heavily reworked autograph breaks off at the outset of the second movement. But the fragmentary work that later came into the hands of Johannes Brahms from Schubertâ??s estate delighted its new owner so much after its premiere in 1867 that Brahms had the first movement published three years later as Schubertâ??s â??Posthumous Workâ? â?? thus paving the way into audiencesâ?? hearts for this little gem. Schubertâ??s autograph manuscript features such numerous divergences in dynamics and articulation that editor Egon Voss suspects it to be one of Schubertâ??s experiments withvariations. This is why in his Urtext edition he proceeds with extreme restraint in issuing additions and changes with respect to parallel passages ¬â?? thus making Schubertâ??s diversity of ideas comprehensible for performing musicians. For all who want a peek inside Schubertâ??s workshop the few measures of the second movement are included as a bonus! Schubertâ??s composition of a new string quartet begun in December 1820 was alas never to get beyond the first movement the heavily reworked autograph breaks off at the outset of the second movement. But the fragmentary work that later came into the hands of Johannes Brahms from Schubertâ??s estate delighted its new owner so much after its premiere in 1867 that Brahms had the first movement published three years later as Schubertâ??s â??Posthumous Workâ? â?? thus paving the way into audiencesâ?? hearts for this little gem. Schubertâ??s autograph manuscript features such numerous divergences in dynamics and articulation that editor Egon Voss suspects it to be one of Schubertâ??s experiments withvariations. This is why in his Urtext edition he proceeds with extreme restraint in issuing additions and changes with respect to parallel passages ¬â?? thus making Schubertâ??s diversity of ideas comprehensible for performing musicians. For all who want a peek inside Schubertâ??s workshop the few measures of the second movement are included as a bonus!

Op. 14 1: Streichquartettfassung der Klaviersonate-This fantastic volume contains Beethoven's String Quartets Op.18 which is the string quartet version of his Piano Sonata Op.14 No.1. Inside there are the complete sets of parts for each individual instrument forthese grand and powerful sonatas. This is the Henle Verlag Urtext Edition which provides one of the most authoriaitve and accurate versions available.

Homunculus is a short (circa 12 minutes) work for string quartet which the composer wrote during the Autumn months of 2007 for the Johannes Quartet.He wanted to compose a piece that would be very compact in form andduration but still contain many different characters and textures. In other words a little piece that behaves like a big piece.He has long been fascinated (and amused) by the arcane spermists’ theory who held the beliefthat the sperm was in fact a 'little man' (homunculus) that was placed inside a woman for growth into a child. This seemed to them to neatly explain many of the mysteries of conception. It was later pointed out that if the spermwas a homunculus identical in all but size to an adult then the homunculus may have sperm of its own. This led to a reductio ad absurdum with an endless chain of homunculi. This was not necessarily considered by spermists afatal objection however as it neatly explained how it was that 'in Adam' all had sinned: the whole of humanity was already contained in his loins.He decided to call my piece Homunculus despite the obvious weaknesses of thespermists’ thinking as he found the idea of a perfect little man strangely moving.