This fourth volume in the Quartetto di Cremona's ongoing Beethoven cycle, even by these great players' well-established standards, is astounding.

There are two quartets on the disc, the opus 18 no 1 (which isn't actually the first-composed of the set - that was more to do with grouping for publication) and the late opus 131 Quartet in C sharp minor, Beethoven's most experimental in the medium. The playing, as ever, is blisteringly detailed and right in your face: you can feel the grain of the music and actually hear the fierce tension of concentration through the players' breathing (part of it; not a distraction). The two works are forensically analysed through these performances, and their staggering originality emerges anew, both in the opus 18, where the continued use of the word "early" seems misleading, and in op 131, where Beethoven's deconstruction of formal orthodoxy has never been more striking. This gripping Cremona cycle goes from strength to strength.

Michael Tumelty