Borodin: String Quartet No. 1; String Quartet No. 2 Lark Quartet (Arabesque); St. Petersburg String Quartet (Sony).
The youthful Lark players provide elegant and refined performances of Borodin’s two string quartets. Yet their readings are rather cool and literal for these passionate works, and the performances are very much on the surface.
There is certainly no lack of emotion in the performances by the St. Petersburg players; if anything, their heated hyperintensity and strong sonority overwhelm at times. Still, the emotional intensity and warmer tonal tapestry of the Russian players are well suited to Borodin’s lyrical works. In the famous Notturno of No. 2–Borodin’s most indelible melody–where the Lark group seems to be merely playing the notes, the Russians’ warm languor penetrates to the heart of Borodin’s nocturnal romanticism.
