Over the years I have played a good deal of Haydn’s quartet music. Not for nothing is he known as the Father of the String Quartet. Quite a lot of his output is playable by even modest players (like me) and all of it gives pleasure. There always seems to be a hidden chuckle just around the corner, and many a time we have ended up a movement grinning at each other from sheer joy.
What I have just discovered (don’t laugh) are the Opuses 1 and 2. If like me you own the Peters edition ’30 Famous Quartets’ you might not even be aware of them. Well hidden Haydn …
In fairness, the ‘Well Tempered Quartet’ qv gives them an honourable mention – ‘For beginners there can be no better course than to go through the quartets in the order he wrote them – the players for whom he wrote them trained and developed their art in that very way’.
However, the weird numbering in Peters’ Editions hides them very well, and at the age of 78 I have just played Opus 1 No 1 !! And very nice it is too.
Play String Quartets ! 