SKU: FG.55011-574-3

ISBN 9790550115743.

Kalevi Aho (b.1949) was only 18 years old when he completed his String Quartet no. 1 in g minor (1967). Nonetheless it was already the second one of its kind: the earlier string quartet in a minor got christened String Quartet No. 0 and banned from performing. The g minor quartet was heard the first time only 50 years after it was born, when the Kamus Quartet premiered it at the Musica Kalevi Aho Festival in Forssa on June 28, 2019. In Aho's home town, Forssa, it was not possible to study composition with a teacher: My model in this and the other works I composed while I was at school was all the mostly tonal music I had personally played on the violin or heard on the radio. The first movement, Moderato, begins in variation form, until followed by a fugue based on the variation theme. The initially lyrical second movement has a quick, virtuosic and light middle section. The third movement is a very quick scherzo that becomes dramatic, and the work ends with a chorale-like finale. The composer tells: When I got to study composition at the Sibelius Academy in autumn 1968 and showed the quartet to my teacher, Einojuhani Rautavaara, he said there was no point my studying tonal harmony and tonal formal constructions any longer; that I could do the exams in them straight away and start the courses in modern music resources there and then..

SKU: PR.14440385S

UPC: 680160029907.

A shorter and less stringent work than my two previous quartets (1992 and 1994), the Fourth Quartet is comprised, almost obsessively, of the interplay between two thematic kernels: (1) a 5-note motto, announced at the outset, derived from pitches in my own name; and (2) a brief legato line of expressive sevenths (minor/major), which is itself born out of the first cell. Both of these fragments constantly pervade the entire work, albeit in ever-changing raiment. The piece is extremely classical in design: four movements played without interruption - slow/fast/slow/fast - with the first and third sections alternating declamatory and calmer gestures, and the second and fourth being, in effect, almost variants of each other. Quartet No. 4 is approximately 20 minutes in duration and each movement, as noted, was written in memory of dear friends who passed away during late 1995 and early 1996. The work was completed in April of 1996 in Ormond, Florida and Fairport, New York. --Sydney Hodkinson.
A shorter and less stringent work than my two previous quartets (1992 and 1994), the Fourth Quartet is comprised, almost obsessively, of the interplay between two thematic kernels: (1) a 5-note motto, announced at the outset, derived from pitches in my own name; and (2) a brief legato line of expressive sevenths (minor/major), which is itself born out of the first cell.  Both of these fragments constantly pervade the entire work, albeit in ever-changing raiment.The piece is extremely classical in design: four movements played without interruption – slow/fast/slow/fast – with the first and third sections alternating declamatory and calmer gestures, and the second and fourth being, in effect, almost variants of each other.Quartet No. 4 is approximately 20 minutes in duration and each movement, as noted, was written in memory of dear friends who passed away during late 1995 and early 1996.  The work was completed in April of 1996 in Ormond, Florida and Fairport, New York.—Sydney Hodkinson.

SKU: HL.48024678

ISBN 9781540058546. UPC: 888680952525.

40 years lie between the composer's multiple award-winning String Quartet No. 2 and this new contribution to the genre. Martin Christoph Redel was motivated by the world's current political situation: by the violation of human rights, by war, torture, violence and expulsion. He includes a soprano part and responds to texts of the Tunisia-born poetess Najet Adouani who had to flee her home country several times herself because she had advocated human rights and freedom of speech there. In my throat nests the pain of all those to whom I lend a voice, is one of her statements that was set to music.

SKU: PR.14440505S

UPC: 680160594603.

The most straightforward and shortest of any of my string quartets to date, the sixth employs only two thematic gestures which are used, perhaps obsessively, throughout: (a) brief melodic lines formed principally of sevenths, and (b) an ascending scale. The formal design is born out of the continual combining, interweaving and juxtaposition of these two elements, which collect themselves into two movements played without pause: the first predominantly slow and pensive, the second rhythmic and driving. Quartet No. 6 is approximately 16 minutes in duration. The score was commissioned by the Los Angeles-based Calder Quartet, four extremely talented young musicians with whom I performed at the Aspen, Colorado, Music Festival, and is dedicated to my wife, Elizabeth on the occasion of our fifty years together. The first movement is written in memory of my father-in-law Howard Deischer (1907 - 2005), who died during the course of composing. The work was completed in April of 2005 in Ormond-by-the-Sea, Florida. -- Sydney Hodkinson.
The most straightforward and shortest of any of my string quartets to date, the sixth employs only two thematic gestures which are used, perhaps obsessively, throughout: (a) brief melodic lines formed principally of sevenths, and (b) an ascending scale.  The formal design is born out of the continual combining, interweaving and juxtaposition of these two elements, which collect themselves into two movements played without pause: the first predominantly slow and pensive, the second rhythmic and driving.Quartet No. 6 is approximately 16 minutes in duration.  The score was commissioned by the Los Angeles-based Calder Quartet, four extremely talented young musicians with whom I performed at the Aspen, Colorado, Music Festival, and is dedicated to my wife, Elizabeth on the occasion of our fifty years together.  The first movement is written in memory of my father-in-law Howard Deischer (1907 – 2005), who died during the course of composing.  The work was completed in April of 2005 in Ormond-by-the-Sea, Florida.— Sydney Hodkinson.