Classical Sessions: Esmé Quartet

Mendelssohn composed his String Quartet No. 2 in A Minor, Op. 13 when he was just 18. Although published as “No. 2”, it was, in fact, his first quartet. “It was written just two years after the Beethoven’s Late Quartets were published,” says the Esmé Quartet. “Many contemporaries found Beethoven’s Late Quartets strange and incomprehensible, but Mendelssohn was fascinated by them.” In a direct nod to the opening notes of the final movement of Beethoven’s Op. 135 Quartet, annotated with the words “Muss es sein?” (“Must it be?”), Mendelssohn opens Op. 13 with his own question, “Ist es wahr?” (“Is it true?”). Mendelssohn returns to the question throughout all four movements, coming full circle in the quartet’s final bars. “When this opening music comes back at the end,” says the Esmé Quartet, “it comes with a new sense of relief, while also having a faint longing quality.” The players are equally keen to point to Mendelssohn’s love of musical form. “The second and fourth movements both contain fugues,” they explain. “It’s amazing to hear how the young Felix Mendelssohn had already developed his skills, moving these four equal voices within an intricate web of counterpoint.” For the Esmé Quartet, the work occupies a special place in their hearts. In 2023, the players took a few months sabbatical from performing together—a “quartet vacation”, as they explain. “It made us appreciate each other even more—the first notes we played after returning were the first page of Mendelssohn’s Op. 13. The motif ‘Ist es wahr’ felt dreamy and out of this world. It was as if the music was asking us: ‘Is this moment real?’.” What we’re witnessing here, then, is the rebirth of an ensemble, returning to the fray stronger than ever. And what better music to do this with than a piece they describe as “youthful, passionate and richly Romantic”?