Mendelssohn & Enescu: String Octets

Lorenzo Gatto, Miguel da Silva, Soloists of the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel

Emerging from the pandemic like a bubble of oxygen from the ocean depths, this recording project is built around two ideas that lie at the heart of the Chapelle Musicale Reine Elisabeth. On one hand it perfectly embodies the ideal of a continuing relationship between masters and artists in residence by bringing together three generations of musicians with Miguel da Silva, Lorenzo Gatto and the young artists currently in residence at the Chapel, providing an opportunity for the former to pass on their mastery and knowledge to the latter. On the other, it also fulfils a desire to bring together a number of artists in an ensemble that unites chamber music with a string orchestra for major works. The string octet, a form made even more attractive by its rarity, was adopted by two composers of genius: Mendelssohn and Enescu. These youthful works, nonetheless mature and filled with musical riches, echo each other here by highlighting their contrasts.

Enescu: Octet in C major Op. 7
Mendelssohn: Octet in E flat major, Op. 20

Christmas 2023

An enjoyable coupling of Mendelssohn’s youthfully exuberant masterpiece of 1825 with Enescu’s more emotionally complex work from 75 years later. Though the performance of the former sets off in slightly deliberate fashion, things pick up nicely thereafter.