*****
This is an unusual way for a quartet to introduce itself on disc, but the music is involving and refined, and the playing it top-notch

FOR FOUR • Bellevue Str Qrt • OUR 8.226943 (61:36)

BLOMBERG For Four. BACH Art of the Fugue: Contrapunctus 1, 9, 14. PURCELL Fantasias: in G; in c. LOCKE Consorts of Four Parts: No. 3 in F; No. 2 in d. The Broken Consort: Fantasia in D. BYRD In Nomine. SCHOP Lachrimae Pavan. MORLEY Lamento. ANONYMOUS 16th-Century Pavan. MORINI Compianto di Didone

This disc, titled For Four, is the Bellevue String Quartet’s debut album, and so it is interesting that they have devoted it largely to music not originally composed for a string quartet. Furthermore, most of it dates from the Baroque and pre-Baroque era. One partial explanation for this is the fact that this ensemble plays period instruments, although they could certainly play Haydn and Mozart, etc., on those instruments—and in fact they have done so. The music on this CD is not particularly unusual, generally speaking, but it is unusual for a string quartet to be playing it, even one that is playing on period instruments, so it’s not as if the Bellevue String Quartet is going to be directly compared with other young ensembles whose debut recordings take them the route of Beethoven, Schubert, and Bartók, for example. This ensemble (Hannah Tibell and Alison Luthmers, violin; Rastko Roknic, viola; Judith-Maria Blomsterberg, cello) is based in Malmö, Sweden.
The program is constructed along a roughly symmetrical plan. The new works, by Hanna Blomberg (b. 1990) and Guido Morini (b. 1959) open and close the program. Blomberg’s work is directly followed by Bach’s Contrapunctus 1 and Morini’s is directly preceded by Contrapunctus 14—the last part of Art of the Fugue, which was left unfinished by Bach. The present performers play it in its unfinished state. Contrapunctus 9 comes roughly in the middle of the program, and the two consorts by Matthew Locke come on other side of it. The performers clearly put a lot of thought into not only what they were going to play, but also into the order in which they were going to play it. What this means to the listener is up to each individual listener, but I do appreciate the idea. Music acts upon performers and listeners, and it also acts on upon other music played on the same program. And besides, as a friend of mine likes to say, “All music is about other music.”
One of the challenges associated with this program is the fact that, stylistically, the works are more similar to each other than they would be in the aforementioned virtual program of Beethoven, Schubert, and Bartók. Contrasts are practically built into that latter program, but the stylistic and emotional contrasts between works are more subtle in the program offered here. (Even the work by Morini is “retro” in style. Only the title work is in-your-face modern.) To appreciate what is going on here more completely, I think it helps for a listener to already be well-immersed in this repertoire, more than they are in traditional string quartet repertoire.
All in all, this is an intriguing and unusual disc, and I have no reservations about it, although it might not be for everyone. All of the performances are top-notch and easy to enjoy, unless you are completely resistant to the sound of period string instruments. The engineering is intimate and clean. In the words of the Quartet itself, this program is a journey, “and we are thrilled to be able to take you along with us.” Raymond Tuttle