String Quartets 1997-2011 : Arditti Quartet (2CD)

When an ensemble like the world-famous and prizewinning Arditti Quartet enters the studio for the purpose of recording a composer's complete output for string quartet, this certainly can be considered an expression of highest praise. Here it holds true for the composer, organist, and master of Japanese archery Christian Ofenbauer, who was born in Graz in 1961 and today teaches as a professor at the University Mozarteum in Salzburg. This double CD includes an extensive cycle of six string quartet movements composed between 1997 and 2011 alongside another protracted solitary work for string quartet from 1999, which was inspired by dn von Horvth's Tales from the Vienna Woods and carries a title borrowed from Bertolt Brecht: Zerstrung des Zimmer's/der Zeit (Destruction of the Room/of Time). With these premiere recordings, an elaborate and haunting compendium of modern composition for string quartet awaits the listener.