Catalogue

Summary:

“The players have the balance well worked out – even with the extra weight in the lower sonorities, the music sounds clear and rarely bottom-heavy, which is some achievement. The first movement of the B flat major Sextet, Op. 18, has a nice sense of sweep, and the extreme glassiness of the music-box variation in the slow movement comes as a pleasing surprise” – BBC Music magazine

“they bring to these performances of Brahms’s lushly textured sextets all the fruits of their experience, investing in these spacious but intelligently navigated architectures a super-rich sound and an impressively unanimous ensemble.” – The Sunday Times

The legacy of the Cypress String Quartet, which celebrated its 20th anniversary and valedictory season in 2016, is sealed by the ensemble’s final recording – the two String Sextets by Johannes Brahms in which they are joined by long-time collaborators, violist Barry Shiffman and cellist Zuill Bailey. True to form, the Cypress String Quartet applied innovation to its last recording: live in front of a studio audience at Skywalker Sound Studio.

Tracklist:

Johannes Brahms (1833 – 1897)                                            
String Sextet No. 1 in B-flat major, Op. 18
1. I. Allegro ma non troppo (14.16)
2. II. Andante ma moderato (9.32)
3. III. Scherzo: Allegro molto (3.14)
4. IV. Rondo: Poco Allegretto e grazioso (10.00)

String Sextet No. 2, Op. 36
5. I. Allegro non troppo (14.28)
6. II. Scherzo. Allegro non troppo (7.28)
7. III. Poco Adagio (8.56)
8. IV. Poco Allegro (8.42)

Total duration: 76.50

Cypress String Quartet
Cecily Ward, Tom Stone, violins
Ethan Filner, viola | Jennifer Kloetzel, cello
with Barry Shiffman, viola & Zuill Bailey, cello

Produced by:  Cecily Ward & Mark Willsher
Recorded by:  Leslie Ann Jones & Mark Willsher
Assistant Engineer:  Dann Thompson
Recorded in front of a live studio audience April 26-30, 2016 on the Scoring Stage at Skywalker Sound, a Lucasfilm Ltd. company, Marin County, CA
Live mix recorded simultaneously to Pro-Tools at 192kHz using a Pacific Microsonics Model Two, and an Ampex ATR 100 1” 2 Track machine with custom electronics by Tim De Paravacini
Analog recording by The Tape Project
Tape Operators: Michael Romanowski and Dan Schmalle
Executive Tape Operator: Paul Stubblebine