Prism V

Prism V completes a fascinating series of five albums where the Danish String Quartet have coupled Beethoven’s late string quartets with works by Bach and other composers. At the heart of this final volume is a wonderfully empathetic performance of Beethoven’s last string quartet, his Op. 135. Exquisitely attuned to one another, the Danish players achieve marvels of nuance and expressivity, locating a wounded vulnerability in the music which eludes many rival ensembles. Passages of spectral beauty haunt Anton Webern’s String Quartet of 1905, and the recital concludes with a searching account of Bach’s great, unfinished Contrapunctus XIV from The Art of Fugue. Stimulating from start to finish, Prism V triumphantly caps an unmissable series of recordings.