Haas Shostakovich Vasks & Novak: Inscape - Alinde Music CD

Alinde Quintet - a new star in the chamber music heavensAt the prestigious ARD Competition in Munich in 2024, the Alinde Quintetemerged as a dazzling new star on the chamber music scene. By that time,they had already earned several notable prizes in London, Copenhagen,and beyond. The players are closely associated with leading Czech andinternational orchestras, including the Czech Philharmonic, the Gustav MahlerJugendorchester, the BBC Symphony Orchestra, and the Royal PhilharmonicOrchestra. On their debut album, the quintet presents the intimate "inscapes"of four composers. In the works of Haas and Shostakovich, the shadow ofwar and Nazi ideology casts a profound, even fatal shadow on their inscapes,while Shostakovich and Jan Novak also ran into conflict with Communistdictatorships. Yet all of the compositions reflect distinct personal inscapes,offering glimpses into the lives of their creators. Haas's imaginative quintetbears the unmistakable imprint of his teacher Leos Janacek, who had diedjust months before the work's completion. Shostakovich's Eighth StringQuartet (arranged by Mark A. Popkin) serves as both autobiography andelegy - a dark, haunting inscape tinged with drama. In Peteris Vasks'scomposition, an ancient Latvian funeral song intertwines with virtuosicpassages and aleatoric sections, evoking the heartrending loss of a kindredspirit. Like a contrasting colour on a canvas, the Concertino by Jan Novakbrings the album infectious joy, playfulness, and jazzy rhythms, lendingradiant colouring to the composer's inscape, which could not be obscuredeven by the dark clouds of Czechoslovakia's totalitarian regime of the 1950s.Throughout the album, the Alinde Quintet draws on the full spectrum ofcolours their instruments can offer, vividly painting each composer's inscape.